Ohio should slam door on proposed marijuana cartel

The November general election ballot will contain a constitutional amendment issue that has received relatively little publicity, but is deserving of strong voter support.

Indeed, the issue can be viewed as the antidote to the ill-conceived, ill-advised proposed constitutional amendment that would legalize the use of marijuana in the state.

Last month, the Republican-controlled General Assembly approved House Joint Resolution 4, a ballot issue aimed at prohibiting monopolies and business interests being written into the Ohio Constitution.

If the ballot issue, which was advocated by Ohio Auditor David Yost, is approved by the voters, it would short-circuit the legalization of marijuana in Ohio. We are stridently opposed to turning the state into pothead heaven.

A group calling itself ResponsibleOhio has collected 276,000 valid signatures of eligible Ohio voters, about 29,000 short of the number needed to put its constitutional amendment on the fall ballot. ResponsibleOhio has one week to collect the remainder.

The centerpiece of the endeavor is the creation of a “marijuana cartel” – in the words of Auditor Yost – of 10 investment groups that would have a monopoly on the large-scale production of the weed in the state.

Yost has made it clear that while he is not against the legalization of marijuana for medicinal purposes only, he is adamantly opposed to the state’s constitution being used to financially benefit a handful of individuals – some from out of state.

“It’s offensive to me that they’re abusing the power of the law to benefit a few,” he said of ResponsibleOhio’s effort.

To stop this abuse of the constitution, Yost asked the GOP-controlled Legislature to enact HJR 4. Ohio voters should now follow the Legislature’s lead and vote yes on the amendment this fall.

Yost’s proposal is exactly what we were hoping for when it became clear that ResponsibleOhio had done such a brilliant job of pulling the wool over the eyes of Ohio voters that it was able to collect so many petition signatures.

The legalization of marijuana for medicinal and recreational use must be stopped. It is bad public policy and is detrimental to the future of Ohio.

Hiring problems

Business owners who require prospective hires to undergo drug testing and may occasionally conduct surprise testing of their employees will be hardpressed to challenge individuals who meet all the qualifications for the job, but yet are ineligible for employment because of drug use.

Proponents of marijuana legalization point to Colorado and the millions of dollars being generated by the sale of the drug on the open market.

However, a serious, in-depth analysis will show that the negatives far outweigh the positives – if getting high can be considered a positive.

There’s another reason for our opposition to legalization, and our call on voters to approve the amendment: the proposed expungement of criminal records stemming from marijuana convictions.

As we argued in an editorial last month, the cleansing of court records should make all law-abiding citizens angry. After all, a country of laws cannot turn a blind eye to those who choose which ones to follow and which ones to break. In a democracy, you are free to violate the law, but if you are caught, you must pay the price.

If there are laws that are unfair or are unequally applied, it’s up to the lawmakers to address such shortcomings.

ResponsibleOhio’s pledge to submit to the Republican Legislature an expungement/reform statute makes clear that the proponents of the legalization of marijuana will go to any lengths to curry favor with Ohio voters.

It’s important for Ohioans to take a stand against the legalization of marijuana because what ResponsibleOhio is actually proposing is a drug cartel made up of 10 investor groups.

We are taken aback that the sister of state Rep. Michele Lepore-Hagan, D-Youngstown, who succeeded her husband, Robert F. Hagan, in the Legislature, is one of the investors.

May we suggest that, at the very least, Nanette Lepore’s membership in the drug cartel raises questions about her sister’s objectivity as a state lawmaker.

Michele Lepore-Hagan represents a city with an unacceptably high crime rate related to drugs and a high addiction rate among the people she represents. While she says she is recusing herself from the debate, she should be leading the opposition to the legalization of marijuana.