Ohio’s Healthcare Freedom Amendment – Historical Overview     

Twenty-six state legislatures have introduced bills to propose constitutional amendments to block the individual mandates contained in the new federal regulations, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.  Ohio’s filing by the Ohio Liberty Council is the nation’s first citizen-initiated action. 

The Ohio Liberty Council is a statewide coalition of non-partisan grass roots groups in Ohio including Central Ohio 9/12 Project, Cincinnati Tea Party, Young Americans for Liberty, Dayton Tea Party, Ohio Freedom Alliance and many more grass roots organizations. By working together, the member groups of the Ohio Liberty Council seek to achieve real results to protect and promote liberty in Ohio.       

Below is an historical overview of the major actions, spanning from March of 2010 to passage of the amendment in November of 2011.  In addition, media links and court documents are provided.

March 3, 2010: Ohio Liberty Council decides to Force Statewide Vote on Health Care Mandate        

The Ohio Liberty Council, a statewide coalition of over 25 grassroots groups, submitted a proposed state constitutional amendment that will “preserve the freedom of Ohioans to choose their health care and health care coverage.” The group filed constitutional amendment summary language and nearly 3,000 signatures from registered voters in 48 counties with the Ohio Secretary of State and Attorney General.        

“The Ohio Liberty Council seeks to preserve the freedom of Ohioans,” said Ohio Liberty Council President Chris Littleton. “This constitutional amendment will do what our leaders in the Statehouse and Congress have failed to do.”       

“The health care reform bill’s requirement to maintain minimum essential coverage essentially asserts that if you are alive, you must buy health insurance that is acceptable to the federal government. However, the mere act of being alive is not commerce that can be regulated by the federal government,” said 1851 Center Executive Director Maurice Thompson. “Accordingly, the legislation is constitutionally tenuous, and will take a backseat to our constitutional amendment, which upon enactment, will be a fundamental right amongst all Ohioans.”       

The amendment provides that:       

• In Ohio, no law or rule shall compel, directly or indirectly, any person, employer, or health care provider to participate in a health care system;
• In Ohio, no law or rule shall prohibit the purchase or sale of health care or health insurance; and
• In Ohio, no law or rule shall impose a penalty or fine for the sale or purchase of health care or health insurance.

 The amendment does not:        

• Affect laws or rules in effect as of March 19, 2010;
• Affect which services a health care provider or hospital is required to perform or provide;
• Affect terms and conditions of government employment; and
• Affect any laws calculated to deter fraud or punish wrongdoing in the health care industry.

Member groups of the Ohio Liberty Council gathered thousands of signatures in just 48 hours. Over 25 groups covering a majority of Ohio counties participated in the signature gathering effort and will now prepare for the next phase of the project.       

The 1851 Center for Constitutional Law filed a complaint with the Ohio Supreme Court seeking a remedy for improper actions taken by the Ohio Ballot Board. On Friday, the Ballot Board, chaired by Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner, rejected a proposed health care freedom constitutional amendment. It ruled the Ohio Liberty Council, the amendment’s sponsor, must resubmit the measure as two separate amendments. The ruling requires the group to rewrite its constitutional amendment, and gather two sets of 402,276 signatures for two separate amendments by June 30.   

In the writ of mandamus filed with the Ohio Supreme Court, the 1851 Center asserts the Ballot Board’s actions are arbitrary and run counter to the board’s own past precedent. The complaint contends the Ohio Liberty Council’s proposed Ohio Health Care Freedom Amendment addresses only one subject and should move forward as one constitutional amendment. Further, the Ballot Board’s ruling “effectively eviscerates the Ohio Liberty Council’s objective, and threatens to eviscerate access to the November, 2010 ballot,” the 1851 Center wrote in the complaint.

“We ask the court to review and correct the Ohio Ballot Board’s improper decision,” said Maurice Thompson, executive director of the 1851 Center. “Our complaint rightfully attacks the constitutional authority of this unelected body to use its duty power to perform purely administrative tasks to destroy proposed constitutional amendments with which it disagrees. It does not have the constitutional authority to interfere with the Initiative rights articulated in Section 1, Article II of the Ohio Constitution.”       

February 13, 2011: Ohio Supreme Court Orders Ballot Board to Certify Amendment Language 

The Ohio Supreme Court today unanimously ruled Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner and the Ohio Ballot Board abused their discretion and violated Ohio law in rejecting ballot language for the proposed Ohio Health Care Freedom Constitutional Amendment. The ruling is a significant victory for constitutional initiative rights, Ohio’s grass-roots liberty movement, and health care freedom in Ohio. The 1851 Center for Constitutional Law argued the case on behalf of amendment sponsors the Ohio Liberty Council.       

The court ordered Brunner and the Ohio Ballot Board to immediately certify the language and allow the petitioners to begin collecting signatures to qualify the issue for the November ballot.       

“Today’s Supreme Court decision upheld the constitutionally-granted rights of citizens to petition their government even when the arbitrary and self-serving decisions of Secretary Brunner and the ballot board attempt to block them,” said 1851 Center Executive Director Maurice Thompson, who also drafted the amendment. “Secretary Brunner and the ballot board tried to use their purely administrative powers to destroy a citizen-initiated amendment with which they disagreed. Thankfully, the court checked this abuse, and Ohioans will have the opportunity to put the preservation of their health care freedom to a vote.”   

In the decision, the justices wrote, “the ballot board abused its discretion and clearly disregarded R.C. 3505.62.” Further, the court upheld the special protections contained in the Ohio Constitution granting citizens the right to petition government.       

Further, the court wrote, “the ballot board has a clear legal duty to liberally construe the right of initiative, and as long as the citizen-initiated proposed amendment bears some reasonable relationship to a single general object or purpose, the board must certify its approval of the amendment as written without dividing it into multiple petitions.”  

July 6, 2011: Signatures Submitted to Place Ohio Health Care Freedom Amendment on November Ballot     

Supporters delivered more than 546,000 signatures to the Ohio Secretary of State to place the Ohio Health Care Freedom Amendment on the November ballot.   The amendment would add a 21st Section to Ohio’s Bill of Rights “to preserve the freedom of Ohioans to choose their health care and health care coverage.”       

For the amendment to move forward, approximately 386,000 signatures must be declared valid.  Internal due diligence indicates that over 440,000 of the collected signatures (over 85 percent) are valid.  This is believed to be the most signatures collected by a volunteer-only organization in Ohio history for a constitutional amendment.  

August 3, 2011: Ballot Board Approves Ballot Language for Issue 3 

The following language was approved for Issue 3 on the November 2011 ballot:       

Issue 3: Proposed Constitutional Amendment to Preserve the Freedom of Ohioans to Choose Their Health Care and Health Care Coverage

Proposed by Initiative PetitionTo adopt Section 21 of Article I of the Constitution of the State of Ohio.

 A majority yes vote is necessary for the amendment to pass.The proposed amendment would provide that:

1. In Ohio, no law or rule shall compel, directly or indirectly, any person, employer, or health care provider to participate in a health care system;
2. In Ohio, no law or rule shall prohibit the purchase or sale of health care or health insurance; and
3. In Ohio, no law or rule shall impose a penalty or fine for the sale or purchase of health care or health insurance.

The proposed amendment would not:

1. Affect laws or rules in effect as of March 19, 2010;
2. Affect which services a health care provider or hospital is required to perform or provide;
3. Affect terms and conditions of government employment; and
4. Affect any laws calculated to deter fraud or punish wrongdoing in the health care industry.

If approved, the amendment will be effective thirty days after election.

Watch the entire recording of the Ballot Board meeting here

August 12, 2011: Supreme Court Denies Effort to Take Issue 3 Off Ballot        

The Ohio Supreme Court this morning rejected a challenge to remove Issue 3, the Health Care Freedom Amendment, from the November ballot. The challenge was brought by ProgressOhio, a left-leaning think tank, who moved to invalidate thousands of signatures collected by petition circulators.       

The Court found, as Amendment’s proponents, through the 1851 Center for Constitutional Law had argued, that the challenger’s “legal claim lacks merit,” and “even if his challenge had substantive validity, Rothenberg’s evidence is insufficient to establish that the part-petitions do not have enough signatures.”       

Volunteer backers of the Health Care Freedom Amendment submitted over 546,000 signatures to the Secretary of State’s office last month. 426,998 signatures were verified, and of those, Progress Ohio attempted to challenge the validity of 62,000.       

The court unanimously ruled the challenge lacked merit and that ProgressOhio’s case did not show the signatures fell short of the 385,245 valid signatures that were required.       

“The Court’s decision is simply another repudiation of Ohio’s advocates of unlimited government, as well as their ongoing effort to use the courts to accomplish that which they fear they cannot accomplish in the light of day, through a free and open election,” said Maurice Thompson, Director of the 1851 Center for Constitutional Law, which defended the proponents.  “Opponents of liberty, no doubt recognizing the importance of squashing a growing grass-roots revival in favor of limited government, decided to bring a case before they knew whether they had a case.  Ultimately, this frivolous politicized approach permeated their legal arguments and evidence.”       

See the Ohio Supreme Court’s decision on this issue here.

November 8, 2011: Election Day Victory for Issue 3  

March 26, 2012: The 1851 Center Analyzes the Amendment’s effect on implementation of Obamacare in Ohio

Does Ohio’s Health Care Freedom Amendment Prohibit It from Enacting an Obamacare Exchange? explains how the Ohio Health Care Freedom Amendment, Section 21 of Ohio’s Bill of Rights, forbids Ohio officials from imposing Obamacare health care exchanges on Ohioans. The document also explores reasons that such exchanges are an unwise policy choice