Ticket (election)

{{voting A ticket refers to a single

election An election is a formal group decision-making process by which a population chooses an individual or multiple individuals to hold public office. Elections have been the usual mechanism by which modern representative democracy has operat ...

choice which fills more than one

political Politics (from , ) is the set of activities that are associated with making decisions in groups, or other forms of power relations among individuals, such as the distribution of resources or status. The branch of social science that studi ...

office or seat. For example, in

Guyana Guyana ( or ), officially the Cooperative Republic of Guyana, is a country on the northern mainland of South America. Guyana is an indigenous word which means "Land of Many Waters". The capital city is Georgetown. Guyana is bordered by the ...

, the candidates for

President President most commonly refers to: *President (corporate title) * President (education), a leader of a college or university * President (government title) President may also refer to: Automobiles * Nissan President, a 1966–2010 Japanese ...

and

Parliament In modern politics, and history, a parliament is a legislative body of government. Generally, a modern parliament has three functions: representing the electorate, making laws, and overseeing the government via hearings and inquiries. Th ...

run on the same "ticket", because they are elected together on a single

ballot A ballot is a device used to cast votes in an election and may be found as a piece of paper or a small ball used in secret voting. It was originally a small ball (see blackballing) used to record decisions made by voters in Italy around the 16 ...

question A question is an utterance which serves as a request for information. Questions are sometimes distinguished from interrogatives, which are the grammatical forms typically used to express them. Rhetorical questions, for instance, are interroga ...

— as a vote for a given

party-list An electoral list is a grouping of candidates for election, usually found in proportional or mixed electoral systems, but also in some plurality electoral systems. An electoral list can be registered by a political party (a party list) or can ...

in the Parliamentary election counts as a vote for the party's corresponding presidential candidate — rather than separately. A ticket can also refer to a

political party A political party is an organization that coordinates candidates to compete in a particular country's elections. It is common for the members of a party to hold similar ideas about politics, and parties may promote specific ideological or p ...

. In this case, the candidates for a given party are said to be running on the party's ticket. "Straight party voting" (most common in some U.S. states) is voting for the entire party ticket, including every office for which the party has a candidate running. Particularly in the era of mechanical

voting machine A voting machine is a machine used to record votes in an election without paper. The first voting machines were mechanical but it is increasingly more common to use '' electronic voting machines''. Traditionally, a voting machine has been defi ...

s, it was possible to accomplish this in many jurisdictions by the use of a "party lever" which automatically cast a vote for each member of the party by the activation of a single lever. "Ticket splitters" are people who vote for candidates from more than one

when they vote for public offices, voting on the basis of individual personalities and records instead of on the basis of party loyalties. While a ticket usually does refer to a political party, they are not legally the same. In rare cases, members of a political party can run against their party's official candidate by running with a rival party's ticket label or creating a new ticket under an independent or ''ad hoc'' party label depending on the jurisdiction's election laws. Depending on the party's rules, these rogue members may retain the membership of their original party. Thus two individuals from one political party can oppose each other under different tickets. This was the case for

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the no ...

ese politician James Soong, who withdrew from the

Kuomintang The Kuomintang (KMT), also referred to as the Guomindang (GMD), the Nationalist Party of China (NPC) or the Chinese Nationalist Party (CNP), is a major political party in the Republic of China, initially on the Chinese mainland and in Ta ...

and ran against its official candidate,

Lien Chan Lien Chan (; born 27 August 1936) is a Taiwanese politician. He was the Chairman of the Taiwan Provincial Government from 1990 to 1993, Premier of the Republic of China from 1993 to 1997, Vice President of the Republic of China from 1996 to 20 ...

, for election as President in the 2000 elections; in the subsequent election in

2004 2004 was designated as an International Year of Rice by the United Nations, and the International Year to Commemorate the Struggle Against Slavery and its Abolition (by UNESCO). Events January * January 3 – Flash Airlines Flight ...

, Soong ran as Lien's running mate. Political party factions may also sponsor tickets in

primary election Primary elections, or direct primary are a voting process by which voters can indicate their preference for their party's candidate, or a candidate in general, in an upcoming general election, local election, or by-election. Depending on the ...

s. When that occurs, several candidates, usually one for each office for which the party's nomination is being contested in the primary, endorse one another and may make joint appearances and share

advertising Advertising is the practice and techniques employed to bring attention to a product or service. Advertising aims to put a product or service in the spotlight in hopes of drawing it attention from consumers. It is typically used to promote a ...

with the goal of securing the party's nomination for the office each is seeking for all ticket members. This system was frequently seen in the "

Solid South The Solid South or Southern bloc was the electoral voting bloc of the states of the Southern United States for issues that were regarded as particularly important to the interests of Democrats in those states. The Southern bloc existed especial ...

" era in the

Southern United States The Southern United States (sometimes Dixie, also referred to as the Southern States, the American South, the Southland, or simply the South) is a geographic and cultural region of the United States of America. It is between the Atlantic Ocean ...

when there was no effective

two party system A two-party system is a political party system in which two major political parties consistently dominate the political landscape. At any point in time, one of the two parties typically holds a majority in the legislature and is usually referr ...

and victory in the Democratic Party primary was considered to be "

tantamount to election A safe seat is an electoral district (constituency) in a legislative body (e.g. Congress, Parliament, City Council) which is regarded as fully secure, for either a certain political party, or the incumbent representative personally or a combinati ...

". Elections Tickets