The Unique Protections of the Ohio Constitution
“The Ohio Constitution is special because it was passed in an era where the people of Ohio believed in individual rights and resented the authority that attempted to interfere with such rights,” and “had no use for any central authority.” This period in the state’s history coincided with the average citizen’s growing awareness of “the mad rush to rob the state treasury and heap up debts to be paid by generations yet unborn,” and recognition that the legislature had become “the pliant tool of individual greed.” Much like today this “mad rush” and “individual greed” involved bailouts and gifts to private corporations that claimed to be necessary to our way of life, particularly railroad and canal corporations.
The 1851 Constitution’s remedy for these threats was to “keep the power in the hands of the legislature, and then tie its hands.” To do this, the delegates to the 1850-1851 constitutional convention authored constitutional provisions that left behind a “self-acting Constitution.” These provisions extend well beyond the protections of the United States Constitution, and beyond those offered by most state constitutions. They make Ohio special place to further individual liberty through litigate for liberty.
The preceding was an excerpt from Defending Liberty in Ohio: A Roadmap for Protecting Freedom and Limiting Government with the State Constitution, written by 1851 Center Executive Director Maurice Thompson.
Download a copy of the Ohio Constitution here.
