Nov. 06--COLUMBUS -- Ohio's ballot issues affecting collective bargaining and health-care come from opposite ends of the political spectrum, but both try to tap into sentiment that government has gone too far.
Like Issue 2 affecting public employees, which Democrats have framed as a referendum on the policies of GOP Gov. John Kasich, Issue 3 has been framed by Republicans as a referendum on Democratic President Obama.
"Health-care decisions should be between a doctor and his patient and not politicians and bureaucrats," said Jeff Longstreth of Ohioans for Healthcare Freedom. "There are two main priorities -- number one, to make sure that Ohio is never a state like Massachusetts with a large state-enforced health-care system, and, number two, to add to the strength of the argument at the federal level that the individual mandate in the new health-care law is unconstitutional.''
Issue 3 asks voters on the Nov. 8 ballot to add a 21st right to the Ohio Constitution's Bill of Rights to prohibit a law or rule from requiring individuals, under the threat of fines, to buy health-care insurance or for most employers to provide it.
The Ohio Health-care Freedom Amendment would affect any law or rule enacted after March 19, 2010, making it clear that the federal health-care reform law is the primary target.
Serious questions have been raised over whether any state can use its constitution to block enforcement of a federal law. That issue is likely to be settled in the courts sometime in the future, but in the meantime, voters in Ohio have been casting ballots for weeks.
"Every major daily newspaper in Ohio has come out strongly against Issue 3 because it is an overly broad amendment to the Ohio Constitution that will endanger health and safety," said Cathy Levine, policy director for the Universal Health Care Action Network of Ohio.
"The actual amendment language prohibits required collection of health data," she said. "It would prohibit Ohio from tracking contagious or other diseases and affect immunization programs that are critical to infection disease control."
She also said taxpayers would have to foot the bill for extensive litigation over the meaning of the amendment.
Beginning in 2014, the federal Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act will require individuals to acquire a minimum level of health-care coverage either through the workplace, the private insurance market, government programs such as Medicare and Medicaid, or new state-run pools through which private insurers would compete for new business from lower-income families and small businesses.
But supporters of the law contend that the proposed constitutional amendment would affect more than the federal law, preventing state government or local governments from imposing similar mandates such as that enacted by former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and a since-shelved executive order by Texas Gov. Rick Perry requiring girls to be vaccinated against a virus that causes cervical cancer.
Issue 3 opponents, however, contend that it also would invalidate state laws enacted since March 19, 2010, that had strong Republican support. These includes laws that place additional penalties on physicians who too freely write prescriptions for addictive pain medications or who perform late-term abortions once a fetus is considered viable outside the womb. They also contend it could affect Mr. Kasich's hope to overhaul Ohio's workers' compensation system.
But those assertions haven't stopped Mr. Kasich, a variety of business groups, and Ohio's pro-life community from backing Issue 3.
The ballot question has gotten nowhere near the attention that Issue 2, the government workers law, has received. Campaign spending has been overwhelmingly lopsided in favor of supporters of the constitutional amendment.
Supporters, primarily the group Ohioans for Healthcare Freedom, reported spending $405,805 since the end of June. The No on Issue 3 campaign, a coalition largely led by health-advocacy groups and Progress Ohio, reported spending none of the nominal $5,100 it raised, but it did benefit from $22,922 in in-kind support from Progress Ohio and the Ohio Education Association.
Contact Jim Provance at: jprovance@theblade.com or 614-221-0496.
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