Press release from the Ohio Green Party:

The Ohio Green Party, upon closer analysis, has withdrawn our support of Issue 2, the Ohio Initiated Monopolies Amendment. We have received input from various attorneys who have read the text of the proposal from a legal standpoint. It is now our opinion the ambiguous wording of the actual proposal raises too many potential problems.

Issue 2 does much more than simply preventing monopolies from being written into the Ohio Constitution, it actually includes the possibility of 3 appointed officials having the capability to nullify a significant part of our Constitution.

Terry Lodge, a highly respected Toledo Attorney and longtime Green Party member – “The main part of Issue 2 is to give sweeping power to a committee appointed by the Secretary of State to consign good constitutional amendments to certain death by forcing anything with economic (not merely monopoly) implications to be subjected to a two-stage vote, no other state in the country has a two-question gauntlet. Issue 2 targets only statewide constitutional amendments, but if it is passed into law, look for another ruse in the next or nearly next election which crushes the local initiative and amendment rights of cities, of zoning referenda, and of ballot measures to increase tax millage for public services like parks, zoos, libraries and schools.”

The judgment of the State Central Committee of the Ohio Green Party is that the possibility would exist for 3 out of 5 members of the State Ballot Board to shut down citizen initiatives completely. Any future initiatives regarding marijuana, single-payer healthcare, or even a local anti-fracking measure could be placed into a political black hole, never to be seen again.

While we retain our absolute opposition to Issue 3, the Ohio Marijuana Legalization Initiative, we now urge Ohioans to vote against Issue 2. The potential for chicanery by the majority party in Ohio to squelch citizen led activism and initiatives (part of the Ohio Constitution since 1912) poses too great a risk.

We join other organizations such as the Ohio ACLU and the SPAN Ohio in opposing Issue 2.

In summation the position of the Ohio Green Party is now a ‘yes’ vote on Issue 1, and ‘no’ votes on Issues 2 and 3.

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Thanks to Phil Mohorich for this news.