Ohio Voters Say No Thanks to ObamaCare's Health Insurance Mandate

On the same day that a D.C. appeals court voted 2-1 to uphold the constitutionality of ObamaCare's individual mandate to purchase health insurance, voters in Ohio rejected any law that would impose such a requirement. Via The Hill:

[The] Ohio initiative is another sign of how just unpopular the mandate is. Democrats — and labor, a key ally of Obama's during the healthcare debate turned out heavily in Ohio for a separate ballot question on collective bargaining. But even with strong turnout around a traditionally Democratic issue, 66 percent of voters had supported the anti-mandate initiative at the time the Associated Press called the vote.

Ohio isn't the first state where the public has formally weighed in against the mandate. Missouri voters passed a similar measure last year by an even larger margin. The problem with both measures, however, is that they're largely symbolic; if the Supreme Court eventually upholds the mandate, then most experts agree that ruling would probably allow the federal government's mandate to preempt state law.