Issue 1 ballot language remains unclear

Most folks recognize that an informed electorate leads to better democracy. Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose is not one of them. That much was apparent from his comments Tuesday after the Ohio Ballot Board did the bare minimum to tweak the explanation voters will see when they cast their ballots on Issue 1, the proposed amendment that would make the state Constitution harder to amend. Rather than explain that the existing standard for amending the Constitution is a simple majority vote, in contrast to the proposed 60 percent standard, LaRose told reporters that more detail would only risk confusing voters and that there's really no argument anyway about whether the proposed standard is better. "Well, I think they have a clear idea of what they're voting on," LaRose said, referring to voters. "The opportunity to make the argument about whether the current number's better, the threshold we've proposed is better. I don't think that we want to overcomplicate the ballot language. I think that we want to put it in front of the voters what they're be asked to approve. And that's exactly what we've done." You certainly wouldn't want to "overcomplicate" voters' decisions by making clear what they're voting to change. LaRose argued that voters would be able to learn more about what Issue 1 would change before heading into the voting booth for a pricey special election Aug. 8. Over objections from Democrats, LaRose and the two other Republican members of the Ballot Board refused to include in the explanation that voters will see any reference to how the standard for amending the Constitution would change: again, from the existing majority support to the proposed 60 percent. Likewise, the so-called ballot language doesn't mention that under the current process, groups that fall short in their initial round of signature gathering to qualify a proposed amendment for the ballot have a brief window in which to "cure" the problem by getting more signatures. Those opportunities would be eliminated were the amendment to pass. The ballot language says that "additional signatures may not be added to an initiative petition," but fails to explain that there's now a cure period. So, what did the Ballot Board change? Acting at the behest of the Republican majority state Supreme Court, it cleared up a confusing bit of language that suggested signature gatherers would need 5 percent of the electors from each of Ohio's 88 counties in order to get a proposed amendment on the ballot. Voters could have believed, incorrectly, that signatures were needed from 5 percent of all registered voters in a county (or those eligible to register) when in fact the actual standard is 5 percent of the registered voters who cast ballots in the most recent gubernatorial election. Again, the ballot language doesn't make clear that the current standard only requires signature gatherers to hit the 5 percent mark in 44 counties. The Ballot Board also altered the title of Issue 1, acting, as in the case of the unclear explanation of the signature standard, at the order of the court. (The court's three Democrats would have made additional changes to address other concerns raised by opponents of Issue 1.) The original formal title for Issue 1 was "Elevating The Standards To Qualify For And To Pass Any Constitutional Amendment." There were two problems with that. First, it suggested that the heightened standard would apply to all attempts to amend the Constitution, which wasn't accurate. The General Assembly can put forward proposed amendments through its own process, as it did with Issue 1. The other was with the word "Elevating," which, as we've noted before, carries a positive connotation. Who, after all, doesn't want to elevate the Constitution? Anyway, here's the new title that voters will see on the ballot: "Elevating The Standards To Qualify For An Initiated Constitutional Amendment And To Pass A Constitutional Amendment." While it's now clearer that the proposed amendment applies only to future amendments initiated by citizens, the title is still loaded in a way that makes it sound as if the change is a positive one. It's not. Issue 1 is an undemocratic power grab by Republicans in the gerrymandered General Assembly. They fear what a simple majority of Ohio voters might do if left unchecked. Indeed, the whole point of the amendment is to make a proposed abortion and reproductive rights amendment widely expected to appear on the November ballot harder to pass. (August elections usually have low turnout, which is why Republicans largely eliminated them last year. They resurrected such an election because they believe it will be politically advantageous to them in this case.) They also worry that voters might approve amendments to end gerrymandering and raise the minimum wage, among other possibilities. Republicans and special-interest groups aligned with them might view limiting the power of the people as a good thing, but Ohio voters shouldn't be fooled.