We WIN When...
We lift our voices
By Crystal G
We gathered in spaces large and small; we organized to sign petitions, and hand out literature, stickers and yard signs: we rallied successfully in Clark County to defeat Issue 1 in August. We were exhilarated to watch our county agree on something so vital to our Democracy. We managed to defeat the proposed amendment that would have taken away our right to make our voices heard by a simple majority: a sign that we are not all too far right or too far left; that we can meet in the middle, once again, to protect our reproductive freedom next month!
But not without a little more help. We understand only too well that this has been a long and challenging process. For us, as Clark County Ohio progressives, it seems that we have talked about this and worked toward it for an eternity. Many of our neighbors think the August special election was the vote to restore reproductive rights, but it was only the start. They are surprised when we tell them we still need their vote.
We therefore have great information to share with you in this election edition of our newsletter. We hope that you won’t put it down because you have been overwhelmed with the fear mongering that you see and hear on television or elsewhere about Issue I in November, which would establish a state constitutional right to make and carry out one’s own reproductive medical decisions. We want to provide facts that you might not know, as well as facts you can share with others who may have been swept up in the recent tide of horribly misleading disinformation. Government overreach has never been so apparent as when our state ballot board wrote and approved a summary of the proposed amendment that is both so drastically incomplete and so inflammatory in its language as to necessitate a court challenge. It is critical that we remind voters that the actual text of the amendment itself did not change; only the opposition’s tactics.
We are proud to say that the majority of Clark County residents agreed that the change the Republicans wanted to make to our state constitution in August was egregious political overreach. It is time once again to raise our voices in November, to make clear that reproductive matters are medical, not legal decisions.