It’s restraint, from where I’m sitting.
Congress can (and should) pass a law requiring proof of citizenship to vote in federal elections. States can’t, and shouldn’t, be telling the feds what they can and can’t do with federal elections.
The door isn’t closed here. Scalia’s trying not to legislate from the bench. If you asked him whether fraud is taking place, I’d like to think he’d reason that the very fact the case made it to their court is evidence enough that people no longer trust the process.
Not trusting the process of federal transfer of power is a very bad sign, since if the ballot box fails, and the soap box fails, all that remains is the ammo box.
That any congress, anytime throughout history ever contemplated that citizenship would not be a prerequisite is an idea too nonsensical to garner credibility.
This is just one more example of where a court decided to allow an asserted legal technicality to interfere with a legitimate State interest.