Abstract: Stock debates about transparency and secrecy usually assume that open voting
and secret voting are mutually exclusive. But these positions present a false alternative;
open and secret voting can be employed as complements in a larger decision-procedure.
In what follows I will propose a hybrid or dual procedure of open-secret voting, and
attempt to specify the conditions under which that procedure works well. I suggest that
open-secret voting can best be justified as an institutional means of obtaining a second
opinion from the voting group. A second opinion of this sort might produce
informational benefits either for the members of the voting group itself, for outside
parties, or for both. (This is a companion paper to Adrian Vermeule, “Second Opinions,” available on SSRN).