This November, Ohioans will vote on Issue 1, a proposed amendment to the state’s notoriously mutable constitution that would enshrine abortion as a fundamental right. Pro-lifers in the state are fighting against the amendment, urging a no vote. Earlier this month, K-Lo went to Columbus, the state capital, for the second annual Ohio March for Life. The march was only part of the campaign that activists in the state are waging to keep this radical change out of the state’s constitution. In the latest issue of National Review, I have an account of this campaign.
The pro-lifers I spoke to, involved in the leadership of right-to-life organizations across the state, know they face a difficult challenge in this vote. A state-level referendum on abortion is yet to favor their cause, including one in neighboring Michigan last year. They face additional challenges from, among other obstacles, the yes-vote side’s well-funded advocates, a biased media, and state-specific political factors.
But they believe they can prevail against the amendment if they make its radicalism clear. The goal of the amendment “seems to be to set the stage for evisceration of any state laws that could be construed as impeding access to abortion,” I write. That would start with the heartbeat law (currently held up in court), and would also include the 24-hour waiting period and parental-notification and -consent laws. The vagueness of its text also paves the way for abortion through all nine months of pregnancy, funded by taxpayers through Medicaid when necessary, and more. The overall effect would be “an abortion regime in Ohio that went well beyond Roe v. Wade.” The prospect of such a regime has united a pro-life movement that is sometimes divided in the state.
As pro-lifers continue trying to make sense of the post-Dobbs landscape, state-level fights sometimes don’t get the resources or even the attention they deserve. But Ohio’s vote should be watched closely.