In the weeks before the 2026 midterm elections, the Supreme Court declined to allow new restrictions on mail-in voting, affirming a principle as old as democratic governance itself: that the rules of participation should not be rewritten while the game is already underway. The decision offered clarity to election officials and voters alike, preserving a method of casting ballots that millions of Americans had come to depend upon. At its core, the ruling was less about mail voting specifically than about the weight courts must give to ballot access when an election is imminent and the stakes ar