Why Ohio voted against legal marijuana — and what it means for the future of the pot debate

Wednesday morning ushered in a new chapter in the battle over legalizing pot.

On Tuesday, voters rejected a controversial marijuana legalization measure at the polls in Ohio, despite polling showing support in Ohio for marijuana legalization. Voters balked at the specifics of the ballot initiative, which would have created an oligopoly on marijuana production for a small handful of the initiative’s wealthy donors.

The initiative faced an uphill battle from the start. The first stumbling block was the nature of the ballot measure itself. It would have essentially written a marijuana oligopoly into the state’s constitution, with the measure’s wealthy backers as the only recipients of licenses to grow marijuana commercially. That didn’t sit right.

The measure was so opposed by Ohio’s legislature that it wrote a competing initiative that appeared on the ballot — one that would explicitly outlaw voter-approved monopolies and oligopolies like the one the legalization measure would create.

Finally, holding the vote in an off-year election meant facing an electorate that’s typically older and more conservative than a presidential electorate.

The defeat of the measure is good news for people on both sides of the legalization debate worried about the co-option of the legalization debate by corporate interests — the threat of “Big Marijuana.”

For their part, legalization advocates are hoping to put the Ohio battle behind them and focus on a number of high-profile legalization measures before voters, and possibly state legislatures, next year. “This was about a flawed measure and a campaign that didn’t represent what voters want,” said Tom Angell of Marijuana Majority, a pro-legalization group. “It’s a shame Ohio voters didn’t have the opportunity to consider sensible legalization in 2015.

He added, “Voters won’t tolerate this issue being taken over by greedy special interests. Our ongoing national movement to end marijuana prohibition is focused on civil rights, health and public safety, not profits for small groups of investors.”

The Ohio experience may serve as a warning to lawmakers at the state and federal level grappling with legalization questions. Drug policy experts have cautioned that if lawmakers fail to act on marijuana reform and leave changes up to voters to decide, the outcome could be flawed legislation that doesn’t do as much as it could to prevent possible harms associated with legal marijuana — like the Ohio measure.

Given the trends in national polling on marijuana legalization — support was nearly 60 percent in the latest Gallup poll, up sharply year-over-year — it doesn’t appear the issue will be going away any time soon. Proactive legislatures in Vermont and Rhode Island may pass marijuana legalization measures next year. Lawmakers in other states might want to take note.

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