It's interesting to see the right attempt to frame the battle of the Employee Free Choice Act as one as  where they are protecting a sacred right, that of a secret ballot, enshrined in the Constitution by the Founding Fathers. It's actually nowhere to be found in the Constitution. Not surprising since the secret ballot dates to 1856. It's an Australian invention hence the secret ballot is also called the Australian ballot. The English would adopt the procedure in 1872. Its adoption elsewhere was much slower.

In the United States, the history of the secret ballot is a short one nor was its initial implementation in the US some paragon of democratic virtue either. As with much of American history, there are myths and then there is the truly mythical. The secret ballot forms part of the latter. The fight for expansion of the suffrage has been long and exhaustive nor are we by any means done. The sad truth is the secret ballot was introduced in Louisville in 1888 as a means of curtailing suffrage, not expanding it (the Utah territory did use a secret ballot in 1878 in an experiment but Louisville's adoption is the first sustained use of the Australian-style ballot).

In the 19th century, the most common method of constricting the electorate was a literacy or education test. The Know-Nothing Party, originally a secret society called the Order of the Star-Spangled Banner, in the 1850s first espoused literacy tests as a way to limit Irish Catholic participation in electoral politics. Not surprisingly it was Massachusetts and Connecticut that first adopted such tests.

Ballots in the second half of 19th century were the domain of political parties. A voter received his ballot directly from a party organizer. While these had the names of that party's candidates, the ballots also had a symbol on it and varied by size, color and shape. Literacy was not required and voting was hardly secret. All that a voter had to do to vote was to drop that ballot in a box.

The standardization of the ballot was an effort to enforce literacy laws. A standard ballot was printed by the city or state and it contained the names of all the candidates for office from all parties. The voter would receive the standard ballot, then often but not always in private, would then place a mark by the names of the candidates for whom he wished to vote. Harvard historian Alexander Keyssar picks up the story:

The Australian ballot, was, however, an obstacle to participation by many illiterate foreign-voters in the North, as well as uneducated black voters in the South.

It is true, however, the Australian ballot was also pushed by reformers who wished to curtail the power of the political machines. In this regard, Ohio took the lead. James E. Campbell, who became Ohio's governor in 1890, made ballot reform one of the major issues of his administration. He declared that government failed to meet the people's needs "unless every elector is secured a free, secret, untrammeled and unpurchased ballot which shall be honestly counted and returned." Governor Campbell pushed  Ohio to adopt the Australian Ballot System which it did in 1891.

It's interesting to note that as of 1920, thirteen states in the North and West would still have literacy requirements to vote. Oddly enough, the Republican party controlled these states. Take Wyoming where in 1889 the state instituted a secret ballot and a literacy requirement in order to disenfranchise an approximate 2% of the population that was foreign-born but attracted to work in the state's mining industry.

This attempt by the right to frame the battle over the EFCA as one over a secret ballot is little more than a ruse. And one that isn't even historically accurate.