Ohio rejects the individual mandate

Tuesday’s election in Ohio presented, among other things, two issues where the results could not have been more diverse, and confusing.

Earlier, Ohio passed a law that essentially prohibited collective bargaining for public unions.  Unlike the Wisconsin law, the Ohio law also applied to police, fire, and first responders.  There was a ballot measure to repeal that law, and, it should come as no surprise that the unions heavily backed and financed the repeal measure.

The other ballot measure was to change the Ohio Constitution to prohibit the imposition of the Obamacare individual mandate. 

The results are interesting.  Ohioans voted 61% to 39% to repeal the ban on collective bargaining.  Given that, one would have expected that, with the high union turnout, the measure to prohibit the individual mandate would have “gone down in flames”.

Not so.  Ohioans voted 66% to 34% to change their Constitution to ban any requirement that a citizen must have health insurance.

Of course, if Obamacare is held to be constitutional, then it matters not what the citizens of Ohio say.  But, Ohio is an important state in next year’s presidential election, and, it would appear that Ohioans don’t think much of President Obama’s “signature accomplishment”.