On June 6, the Mississippi Secretary of State asked the U.S. Supreme Court to hear Watson v Republican National Committee, 24-1260. The issue is whether the 1872 federal law telling states to hold congressional elections in the first Tuesday after the first Monday of November of even-numbered years means that all ballots must be received by that date. Here is the cert petition.

In October 2024 the Fifth Circuit had ruled that the 1872 federal law setting congressional election day means that all ballots must be received by election officials by that day. No other circuit ever came to that conclusion, although there haven’t been many cases. The Secretary of State’s petition to the court says if the Fifth Circuit is correct, then the laws of 29 other states are also void.

The current Mississippi law, which the Fifth Circuit invalidated, says absentee postal ballots must be postmarked by election day, but they are valid if they are received in the elections office by five business days after the election.

The U.S. Supreme Court has already accepted a related case, from Illinois. That case, Bost v Illinois State Board of Elections, 24-568, will probably be argued near the end of 2025. But in that case, the lower court had not only upheld the Illinois law that allows absentee ballots to arrive a few days after election day; it also said the plaintiffs don’t even have standing to raise the issue. The U.S. Supreme Court will only decide the standing issue, not the timing issue.

In the Mississippi case, the U.S. District Court had ruled that the Republican and Libertarian Parties do have standing, but that the Mississippi law does not conflict with the 1872 law.