On March 27, the Third Circuit ruled 2-1 that Pennsylvania may invalidate postal ballots if the voter forgot to fill in the date on the outer envelope, or to put the wrong date or year. Pennsylvania State Conference of the NAACP Branches v Secretary, 23-3166.

The majority opinion is by Judge Thomas L. Ambro, a Clinton appointee. It is also signed by Judge Cindy K. Chung, a Biden appointee. The dissent, which is as long as the majority opinion, is by Judge Patty Shwartz, an Obama appointee. Here is the Opinion.

The 1964 federal Civil Rights Law has a provision relating to elections. It says no state may prevent someone from voting if he or she makes an error that is not material to whether he or she should be able to cast a ballot. This is known as the “materiality” law. The majority construed that law to only regulates who is allowed to vote, but not to whether the ballot should be counted.

The majority acknowledges that the Pennsylvania requirement is not needed. When ballots are received by the elections office, they are date-stamped, so whether the voter also dated the envelope doesn’t have any practical significance.