Black Voters Matter Fund v. Secretary of State for the State of Georgia, No. 20-13414 (11th Cir. 2021)
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In Georgia, in-person voters can vote on election day or during advance voting. Absentee voters, after applying for and receiving an absentee ballot, are responsible for returning their ballots directly to the county election office, depositing them into a ballot drop box, or mailing them to that office. The statute requires neither the state of Georgia nor county governments to cover the cost of postage for mailing ballots. Plaintiffs alleged that the Twenty-Fourth Amendment or the Equal Protection Clause required Georgia to pay for postage for voters who choose to return their absentee ballots by mail; by not covering the cost of postage, Georgia is imposing an unconstitutional “poll tax” or fee on some absentee voters.
The Eleventh Circuit affirmed the dismissal of the suit. Requiring the payment of postage is not a “tax” or unconstitutional fee on voting. Georgia voters, without paying any money, have several options; even those voters who choose to mail in their absentee ballots buy postage from the U.S. Postal Service and the proceeds from postage sales are paid to USPS—not the state of Georgia— to account for the costs associated with delivering the mail. These voters are buying services from USPS. Georgia does not receive any money from those sales.
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