In 2023, New York adopted a law enabling all registered voters to vote early by mail. The State Democracy Research Initiative filed an amicus brief urging the New York Court of Appeals to uphold the law, arguing that the law was within the legislature's constitutional authority to enact. In 2024, the New York Court of Appeals upheld the law.
On July 3, the State Democracy Research Initiative submitted an amicus brief in Stefanik v. Hochul, a case pending before New York’s highest court, the Court of Appeals. The brief is on behalf of six New York-based legal scholars with nationally recognized expertise in state constitutional law, state and local government law, and the law of democracy.
The case involves a state constitutional challenge to New York’s recently enacted vote-by-mail law. The plaintiffs contend that the New York Constitution prohibits lawmakers from offering the state’s voters a universal vote-by-mail option. The brief, filed in support of the law’s defenders, contends that the democratic commitments embedded in the New York Constitution’s text, history, and structure support the legislature’s authority to adopt measures, like this one, that aim to facilitate electoral participation. The brief also discusses precedents from other states that have upheld similar laws against similar legal challenges.
The group of legal scholars includes Richard Briffault (Columbia Law School), Jessica Bulman-Pozen (Columbia Law School), Wilfred U. Codrington III (Cardozo Law School), Nestor Davidson (Fordham Law School), James A. Gardner (University at Buffalo School of Law), and Michael Pollack (Cardozo Law School).
On May 9, 2024, the New York Court of Appeals upheld the challenged law.