THE SECRET BALLOT WAS AN AUSTRALIAN INNOVATION:  It’s interesting that the polls for the recent election in Australia were wrong.  Maybe some voters felt uncomfortable telling pollsters whom they intended to vote for.  (Or maybe there were other reasons for the error.)  But it is worth pointing out that Australia was the home of the secret ballot in the 1850s.  Once commonly known in the USA as the “Australian ballot,” it was not the rule in this country until decades after that.