overvote

English

Etymology

From over- +‎ vote.

Noun

overvote (plural overvotes)

1. (US politics) A case in which a voter has marked a ballot for more choices than allowed by the rules
   • 2001, Richard A. Posner, Breaking the Deadlock‎^[1], →ISBN, page 78:

     An overvote that took the form of punching Gore's chad and then writing his name (or Lieberman's) in the place for a write-in candidate would unambiguously manifest the voter's intention to vote for Gore.

2. (business) A case in which more votes are cast in a voter's name than allowed under the rules
   • 1978, Martin Lipton et al., Takeovers and Freezeouts‎^[2], →ISBN, page 17:

     Overvotes are a relatively common phenomenon for shares held in a street name.

Verb

overvote (third-person singular simple present overvotes, present participle overvoting, simple past and past participle overvoted)

1. (US politics) To spoil a ballot by marking it for more choices than allowed by the rules
   • 2005, United States Government Accountability Office, Elections‎^[3], →ISBN, page 10:

     […] a poll worker can manually override the program and accept the ballot, even though it has been overvoted or undervoted.

2. (business) To cast more votes than allowed under the rules
   • 1955, Stock Market Study‎^[4], page 1429:

     I know a great deal of difficulty ensues, and frequently brokers' shares are overvoted.

3. (obsolete) To outvote or overrule
   • 1653, William Jenkyn, An Exposition Upon the Epistle of Jude‎^[5], published 1839, page 119:

     Caleb and Joshua would have been overvoted by almost six hundred thousand Israelites; […]

Related terms

• outvote
• undervote
• subvote
• supervote

See also

• overvote on Wikipedia.Wikipedia