The tally of affirmative and negative votes on some proposal. Especially used to describe vote results in a legislature or other deliberative body.
See, e.g. U.S. v. Ballin, 144 U.S. 1 (1892).
Twenty-three Senators from the committee voted on the bill. The vote was very close and broke down as follows:
Yea: 13
Nay: 10
After weeks of suspenseful debate, the ayes had it. The yeas and nays were repeatedly announced on all the major news channels that very night.
"The constitution (art. 1, § 5) provides that ‘each house shall keep a journal of its proceedings;’ and that ‘the yeas and nays of the members of either house on any question shall, at the desire of one-fifth of those present, be entered on the journal.’ Assuming that by reason of this latter clause reference may be had to the journal, to see whether the yeas and nays were ordered, and, if so, what was the vote disclosed thereby . . . the journal may be appealed to on the question whether a law has been legally enacted . . . ."
