PA Supreme Court Dismisses Case Challenging Absentee Ballot Law

Philadelphia Inquirer / Twitter ^ | 11/28/2020 | Jonathan Lai

[Boise3981]

Any diminution of votes, per Reynolds v. Sims, is Unconstitutional. Any violation of a state's Constitution that materially increases the probability that votes are being diminished by the fake / illegal votes is therefore a violation of Reynolds v. Sims, and thus becomes, ipso facto, a Federal matter.

Well, that's not what Reynolds is about. Reynolds is about denying equal power to voters based on geography. It's not about diminishing one set of votes by allowing other people to vote. But even allowing for that idea, when you say "violation of a state's Constitution" that would allow illegal votes is a problem - you're right. But what you're missing is that it's the PA state supreme court who gets to say whether the state constitution was violated. And they dismissed the case.

Key point: The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania did not rule that the Act 77 was Constitution. It simply ruled that plaintiffs had waited too long to bring their complaint (laches.)

Distinction without a difference. Okay, they didn't rule Act 77 constitutional. But they did rule it was in effect for 2020 and it's too late to challenge it. And so - at least as far as 2020 is concerned - it is constitutional.

Still no federal issue.

If you're agitating about Act 77 for 2024 or 2028 then you may have a point (I still don't think the SCOPA is going to agree, but maybe). But for 2020, it's done.

Imagine any court getting away with arguing that any suit alleging a violation of the Constitution must be dismissed because the complaint wasn't timely. Imagine SCOTUS rejecting the original Roe v. Wade on that basis. Or Brown v. Board of Eduction. I could go on.

It happens. For example: The Court ruled that an establishment clause case against "In God We Trust" or the reference to God in the pledge was just too late.

But it's not too late to challenge Act 77 as unconstitutional. It's just too late to challenge it re the results of 2020. And that's pretty standard election law. You can't overturn the votes after the fact.

[sourcery]

There are so many logical contradictions and provable falsehoods in your comment, and they’re so blatantly obvious, that I have no need to comment further.

[Boise3981]

Free Republic spent time advocating for the theory that the SCOPA extension to the ballot receipt deadline was unconstitutional because only the legislature could make changes to election law and the courts - even the state supreme court doing so using the state constitution - couldn't overrule the legislature.

This is an argument that Alito agreed with as he said there was a likelihood that it would succeed and ordered those ballots received after 11/3 segregated.

Now you're trying to argue the exact opposite: that a law passed by the legislature not only CAN be overturned by the state supreme court, but that it should be even after the election happened and after the state supreme court said it was too late.

It's a state law, passed by the state legislature. That should be the end of it. To the extent that the state constitution might say something different, that's a subject for the state supreme court.

This isn't, in any way, a federal issue. Elections are run by the state, in a manner the state legislature describes, possibly bound by the state constitution as well but that will be interpreted and applied by the state supreme court. State. State. State.

You'll notice that Alito asked PA to respond, but set the due date for the response on 12/9 while safe-harbor is on 12/8. Alito doesn't think this is a thing either.