Introduction

This precedential Third Circuit decision addresses a recurrent tension in election law: how far states may go in regulating the mechanics of voting without unconstitutionally burdening the franchise. Pennsylvania’s Election Code—read by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court to require county boards to discard mail ballots if the return envelope’s voter declaration is undated or misdated—stood on the line. The Third Circuit holds that this “date requirement,” as enforced through a categorical no-count rule, violates the First and Fourteenth Amendments under the Anderson-Burdick framework.

The case was brought by Pennsylvania voter Bette Eakin, joined by the DSCC, DCCC, and AFT Pennsylvania, after her 2022 mail ballot was rejected for lacking a handwritten date on the return envelope. She sued all 67 county election boards. Although only Berks and Lancaster Counties defended the rule in the district court, the Republican National Committee and other party entities intervened to support the date requirement, and the Commonwealth itself intervened on appeal. The Pennsylvania Department of State and numerous counties supported the plaintiffs. The district court granted summary judgment to the plaintiffs; the Third Circuit now affirms.

At stake was whether Pennsylvania could continue discarding thousands of otherwise valid mail ballots over a technical error that neither proves voter ineligibility nor affects timeliness. The Third Circuit’s answer: no. Even minimal burdens on the right to vote require relevant, evidence-backed state interests; speculative or symbolic rationales are not enough.

Summary of the Judgment

• Holding: Pennsylvania’s practice of discarding mail ballots because the voter’s return-envelope declaration is undated or misdated violates the First and Fourteenth Amendments. The rule fails Anderson-Burdick balancing because the asserted state interests (efficiency, solemnity, fraud detection/deterrence) do not justify the burden imposed.
• Framework: Anderson-Burdick applies to the challenged practice. The burden on voters is minimal (not de minimis), but even minimal burdens require genuine, relevant state interests supported by facts and a reasonable nexus.
• Key clarifications of law:
  • Anderson-Burdick applies to mail-voting regulations even if there is no free-standing constitutional right to vote by mail. Once a state offers mail voting, it must administer it constitutionally.
  • Courts may consider the downstream consequences of noncompliance (i.e., that ballots will not be counted and many voters will have no cure opportunity) when assessing the burden on the right to vote.
  • Anderson-Burdick’s “less exacting” review for minimal burdens is not rational basis review; courts must actually weigh burdens against proven state interests.
• Materiality Provision claim: The plaintiffs’ statutory claim under the federal Materiality Provision (52 U.S.C. § 10101(a)(2)(B)) remains foreclosed in the Third Circuit by Pennsylvania State Conference of NAACP v. Secretary of the Commonwealth (2024), which confines that statute to “who may vote,” not “how a qualified voter must cast a ballot.” The constitutional ruling here does the work.
• Relief: County election boards are enjoined from rejecting mail ballots for date omissions or inaccuracies on the return-envelope declaration. The decision does not forbid the Commonwealth from printing a date line on envelopes; it forbids using that line to discard ballots.

Analysis

Precedents Cited and Their Influence

The court situates its holding within a dense network of Supreme Court, Third Circuit, and other circuit precedents:

• Anderson v. Celebrezze (1983) and Burdick v. Takushi (1992): The cornerstone balancing test for election regulations, requiring courts to (1) gauge the burden on First and Fourteenth Amendment rights and (2) weigh that burden against the state’s precise, evidenced interests. The Third Circuit applies Anderson-Burdick, stresses its flexibility, and refuses to collapse it into rational basis review for minimal burdens.
• Timmons v. Twin Cities Area New Party (1997) and Norman v. Reed (1992): Clarify that severe burdens trigger strict scrutiny; lesser burdens face “less exacting review,” but still with meaningful weighing. The Third Circuit quotes and deploys this architecture.
• Crawford v. Marion County Election Board (2008): Demonstrates that even slight burdens require justification by legitimate interests, and illustrates how concrete examples (e.g., voter-ID’s connection to fraud prevention) matter. The Third Circuit contrasts Crawford’s intuitive, evidence-supported fit with the absence of any meaningful connection between a handwritten date and Pennsylvania’s stated interests.
• Mazo v. New Jersey Secretary of State (3d Cir. 2022): Confirms Anderson-Burdick applies to rules that burden a relevant constitutional right and primarily regulate electoral mechanics. Also clarifies Anderson-Burdick does not apply where the burden is merely de minimis. The Third Circuit uses Mazo to frame the analysis and to emphasize the distinction between “minimal” and “de minimis.”
• Pennsylvania State Conference of NAACP v. Secretary of the Commonwealth (3d Cir. 2024): Limits the federal Materiality Provision to “who may vote,” not “how votes are cast.” It forecloses the plaintiffs’ statutory claim but allows the constitutional claim to proceed.
• McDonald v. Board of Election Commissioners (1969): Often invoked to argue there is no constitutional right to absentee voting. The Third Circuit explains why McDonald does not end the inquiry: once a state chooses to confer a voting modality, it must administer it constitutionally. The court analogizes to cases like Kramer (1969), Meyer (1988), and Buckley (1999), which hold that state-created electoral mechanisms (e.g., school board elections or initiatives) must still comply with constitutional protections if used.
• Pa. Supreme Court cases: In re Canvass of Absentee and Mail-in Ballots of November 3, 2020 General Election (2020) and Ball v. Chapman (2023) interpret the state statute to require rejection of undated/misdated ballots; Pa. Democratic Party v. Boockvar (2020) holds there is no statutory right to notice and cure. The Third Circuit accepts the state-law backdrop but holds the no-count enforcement unconstitutional under the federal Constitution.
• Other circuits: The Sixth, Ninth, and Eleventh Circuits have applied Anderson-Burdick to mail voting mechanics (e.g., NEOH, Hobbs, Lee), supporting the Third Circuit’s approach. The Seventh Circuit took a different path (rational basis for an absentee receipt deadline in Common Cause Indiana v. Lawson), and the Eighth recognized the point but still used Anderson-Burdick (Org. for Black Struggle). The Third Circuit’s opinion candidly locates its analysis among these strands.

Legal Reasoning

1) Anderson-Burdick applies to mail-voting rules

The court directly addresses the “no right to vote by mail” argument (often lodged under McDonald) and rejects it as dispositive. Two distinct reasons:

• State-created mechanisms must be constitutional in operation. Once Pennsylvania offers mail-in voting, it cannot administer it in a way that contravenes the First and Fourteenth Amendments. The court analogizes to initiatives and school board elections: the state may create them, but it may not structure them in a discriminatory or unduly burdensome way.
• PA’s own rules foreclose in-person fallback. Under 25 P.S. §§ 3146.2(i)(1), 3150.12(f), a voter who has applied for or returned a mail ballot generally may not vote in person unless they surrender the mail ballot at the polls. Once mailed, surrender is impossible. Combined with the lack of a statewide notice-and-cure regime (see Boockvar), the consequence of a date error is disenfranchisement—not a mere inconvenience.

2) Step One—Burden: Minimal, not de minimis

The Third Circuit carefully parses the burden:

• Ease of compliance: Writing a date is easy; the rule is non-discriminatory on its face.
• But downstream consequences matter: The court expressly holds that burden analysis may and should include the law’s real-world impacts—here, rejection of thousands of ballots and, for many voters, no chance to cure or to vote in person. That consequence is not speculative. Over 10,000 rejections occurred in 2022; even after envelope redesigns in 2024, roughly 4,500 ballots were rejected for date defects, and political control can hinge on numbers like these (as the RNC itself acknowledged in its motion to expedite).
• Data and experience: The court emphasizes that evidence matters in Anderson-Burdick balancing. It relied on the record showing the number of disqualifications and the lack of uniform notice/cure mechanisms.
• Conclusion on burden: Minimal burden (because compliance is easy and not targeted to a group), but decidedly not de minimis (given the concrete, substantial disenfranchisement and lack of fallback options).

3) Step Two—State interests do not justify the burden

Applying the “less exacting” side of Anderson-Burdick (because the burden is minimal), the court weighs the state’s asserted interests and finds them insufficient:

• Efficiency: The date on the declaration is not used to determine eligibility or timeliness; timeliness turns on receipt by 8 p.m. on Election Day and is tracked via time-stamping and the SURE system. Checking handwritten dates actually adds work and slows administration. County boards and the Secretary have said as much in prior filings; appellee counties repeated it here.
• Solemnity: While voting is a solemn act, the signature under penalty of perjury already conveys the legal gravity. The court finds no incremental solemnity in a handwritten date, especially compared with the structured application, verification, and canvassing steps already in place.
• Fraud detection/deterrence: The connection between a handwritten date and fraud prevention is, at best, negligible. The RNC’s lone criminal example (Commonwealth v. Mihaliak) involved a deceased voter’s ballot—but the county found the issue via SURE, not from the handwritten date. The court concludes that sacrificing thousands of otherwise lawful votes to address a remote, atypical scenario is an unreasonable trade-off under Anderson-Burdick.

Importantly, the court underscores a doctrinal point: even for minimal burdens, Anderson-Burdick is not rational basis review. Courts must weigh the record-supported fit between burdens and interests. If the fit is poor or the interests are not advanced by the challenged rule, the rule fails. That is what happened here.

Impact and Significance

Immediate effects in Pennsylvania

• County election boards may not reject or set aside mail ballots for date omissions or inaccuracies on the return-envelope declaration.
• The Commonwealth may continue to include a date line on envelopes; the decision addresses only the use of that date to invalidate votes.
• Other statutory requirements remain in force: receipt deadlines, secrecy-envelope rules, signature requirements, ID verification at application, and post-election audits are unaffected.
• Boockvar’s rule that there is no statutory right to notice and cure persists; this decision does not create a constitutional notice/cure requirement. However, because date defects can no longer be a basis for rejection, the practical need for date-related cures diminishes.

Broader doctrinal and litigation effects

• Anderson-Burdick governs mail-voting mechanics within the Third Circuit (PA, NJ, DE, VI). Even without a freestanding right to vote by mail, regulations of mail voting must satisfy First/Fourteenth Amendment balancing.
• Downstream consequences are part of “burden”: Courts and litigants should frame the burden analysis to include real-world effects, including irreparable loss of the vote caused by minor paperwork errors.
• “Less exacting” balancing ≠ rational basis: States must bring evidence and a reasonable nexus; symbolic or hypothetical justifications will be insufficient, especially when thousands of votes are at stake.
• Materiality Provision path narrowed in the Third Circuit by NAACP (2024), but constitutional claims remain a viable avenue for relieving minor-ballot-error disqualifications that do not go to voter qualification or ballot timeliness.
• Potential ripple effects: Jurisdictions that still reject mail ballots for non-substantive envelope errors (e.g., date formats, extraneous markings) will face heightened scrutiny. Policies like signature-mismatch regimes, ID-number mismatches, and minor information omissions will need evidence of how they advance concrete interests relative to their burdens.
• Possible Supreme Court interest: The opinion deepens an inter-circuit conversation about how to treat minimal burdens, whether to cabin Anderson-Burdick to in-person voting, and whether “less exacting” review is functionally rational basis. The Third Circuit’s clear stance could tee up future review if splits sharpen.

Complex Concepts Simplified

• Anderson-Burdick: A two-step balancing test for election rules:
  1. Measure the burden the rule places on constitutional rights (right to vote, association, expression).
  2. Weigh that burden against the government’s precise, evidence-backed interests and how well the rule furthers them.
  Severe burdens need narrowly tailored, compelling interests; lighter burdens still require real, relevant justifications.
• Minimal vs. de minimis burden: “Minimal” means small but real. “De minimis” means so slight or speculative that it effectively does not burden the right. The date rule’s burden was minimal (not de minimis) because it actually caused thousands of lost votes with no cure path.
• Downstream consequences: Courts don’t just ask “Is it easy to comply?” They also ask, “What happens if a voter slips up?” If the answer is “Their vote is not counted and they can’t fix it,” that’s a real burden.
• Materiality Provision (52 U.S.C. § 10101(a)(2)(B)): A civil-rights statute barring denial of the vote for immaterial paperwork errors in processes “requisite to voting.” In the Third Circuit, it covers who is qualified to vote, not how qualified voters cast ballots (NAACP 2024). This case instead relies on the Constitution.
• SURE system: Pennsylvania’s statewide voter database and barcode-tracking infrastructure. It time-stamps receipt, records ballot issuance and return, flags deceased voters, and helps prevent double voting—functions that make the handwritten envelope date functionally superfluous.

What the Ruling Does and Does Not Do

• Does:
  • Bar Pennsylvania counties from rejecting a mail ballot solely because the return-envelope declaration is undated, misdated, or contains stray markings in the date field.
  • Require evidence-backed state interests connected to the rule’s purpose, even for minimal burdens.
  • Confirm that courts may consider real-world, downstream disenfranchisement when assessing burden.
• Does not:
  • Eliminate the date line on return envelopes.
  • Change receipt deadlines, secrecy-envelope rules, signature requirements, or other substantive safeguards.
  • Create a general notice-and-cure right under Pennsylvania law.
  • Overrule Pennsylvania’s statutory interpretation; it restrains the no-count enforcement on federal constitutional grounds.

Practical Guidance for Election Officials and Practitioners

• Continue using SURE barcode scanning, receipt time-stamping, and segregation protocols to enforce timeliness and prevent double voting.
• Stop treating handwritten date errors as a basis to set aside ballots. Maintain canvassing workflows without that check.
• Retain the date field if desired for administrative housekeeping, but refrain from using it to reject votes; document internal SOPs to reflect the injunction.
• Train canvassing teams to focus on legally pertinent checks (e.g., voter signature, secrecy envelope, receipt deadline, eligibility challenges) supported by statute and consistent with this ruling.
• Maintain robust chain-of-custody and audit trails. The court’s reasoning favors concrete, auditable tools over symbolic ones.

Conclusion

The Third Circuit’s decision establishes a consequential rule for election administration: even easy-to-follow rules can be unconstitutional when their real-world consequences are to discard large numbers of valid votes without serving substantial, evidence-backed state interests. The court clarifies three significant points in election-law doctrine:

1. Anderson-Burdick applies to the mechanics of mail-in voting. States cannot avoid constitutional scrutiny by labeling a voting modality “optional.”
2. Burden analysis accounts for downstream disenfranchisement, not just the difficulty of the compliance act itself.
3. “Less exacting” review for minimal burdens is still meaningful balancing—not rational basis. States must demonstrate a reasonable, supported connection between the rule and significant interests.

By affirming the district court and enjoining county boards from rejecting ballots over date errors on return envelopes, the court re-centers the constitutional compass on what matters most: counting the votes of qualified electors. Administrative formality must yield when it does not further timeliness, integrity, or eligibility in any real way. In that sense, Eakin v. Adams County Board of Elections is both a specific ruling about a specific box on an envelope and a broader directive about how we measure the legitimacy of rules that risk silencing voters over immaterial mistakes.