Pennsylvania high court to take up long-running dispute over mail-in ballots' return envelope dates
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — The Pennsylvania Supreme Court said Friday it will again consider whether voters should have to write the accurate date on return envelopes used to send their completed mail-in ballots to be counted.
The requirement in state law has generated more than a half-dozen court cases in the past four years, including several that reached the state Supreme Court.
The justices said they will decide whether the dating rule for absentee and mail ballot return envelopes violates a state constitutional provision that elections must be free and equal.
“The constitutional challenge in this appeal is based on the fact, established through years of litigation, that the dating requirements advance no ‘weighty interest’ and serve no purpose in the election process,” wrote Justice Christine Donohue, one of five Democrats on the seven-justice court.
Donohue, joined by one other Democrat, argued the court’s decision to take the case should have gone further and addressed “enforcement of the dating requirements before embarking on an analysis of its constitutionality.”
The case involves 69 mail-in ballots from two state House special elections that a Philadelphia judge had said should be counted even though they lacked a handwritten date on the return envelope.
Read more at: https://www.wpxi.com/news/local/pennsylvania-high-court-take-up-long-running-dispute-over-mail-in-ballots-return-envelope-dates/BX4R6QYNMNFYZIJ5SI2FARPMYU/
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