A terminal for marking a paper ballot which lists a plurality of candidates and which includes a marking space for each candidate which can be either hand-marked by a voter, or machine-marked by the terminal. The terminal scans the ballot to determine the ballot format, and then presents candidate selection options to the voter. Candidate selections are entered through a touch screen menu or through an audio menu and are precisely marked on the front and back sides of the ballot in marking spaces corresponding to the selected candidates by conducting an alignment scan prior to printing that collects data to compensate for ballot rotation angles due to skewing. The ballot is returned to the voter in a form which enables the voter to visually confirm that his or her selections have been marked.