The U.S. Supreme Court declined on Tuesday to hear a bid by civil and voting rights groups to end Pennsylvania's mandate that mail-in ballots bear a handwritten date on the outer envelope, a requirement they contend is unnecessary and has resulted in needless disqualification of legitimate ballots.

The Supreme Court said Tuesday it won’t hear civil rights groups’ appeal seeking to invalidate Pennsylvania’s dating requirement for mail ballots, which has invalidated thousands of votes

The rule in question impacts mail-in voters in Pennsylvania, who are required to place their completed ballot in a secrecy envelope and then into an outer return envelope. On the return envelope, voters must sign and date a declaration affirming their eligibility to vote.

The Pennsylvania Supreme Court will again consider whether voters should have to write the accurate date by hand on return envelopes used to send their completed mail-in ballots to be counted.

The Supreme Court will now decide whether the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court made the right decision in November when it ruled Philadelphia had violated voters rights by rejecting undated ballots in its special election. That ruling, which came days before the November election, was blocked from taking effect in the critical election.

The US Supreme Court on Tuesday declined to hear a challenge to Pennsylvania's mail-in ballot date requirements. The plaintiffs in the class action lawsuit include the NAACP, the American Civil