Choose Life' plates may win Senate OK
Proposal pinned to highway naming bill
Ohioans may yet be able to "Choose Life" on their license plates.
State senators frustrated with inaction on the vehicle tags with the anti-abortion slogan believe they have found a way to get them approved.
Sen. Jim Jordan, an Urbana Republican, said Monday that he planned to tack the proposal onto a little-watched highway-naming bill that is headed to the House floor this week.
The House already approved the tags last November, 67-25, so there's little chance it would change course. Money from sale of the tags would go to local nonprofits that steer women toward adoption instead of abortion. Some of these "crisis pregnancy centers" have come under fire for misrepresenting themselves to pregnant women.
But the maneuver will allow the issue to skirt past Senate Transportation Chairman Jeff Armbruster.
Armbruster is a North Ridgeville Republican who has blocked authorization of the plates for a year. The measure will go straight to the Senate floor without a hearing.
"License plates are just getting so politically charged, that I think we've gotten beyond what license plates are supposed to be for," Armbruster said. "When does it end?"
Sen. Bob Hagan, a Youngstown Democrat, attacked the maneuver as "totally political and politically absurd."
He plans to vote against the measure, though it will be tacked onto a bill that would name a stretch of highway after his late father, former State Rep. Robert E. Hagan.
"What's next? 'Choose Death'? 'Choose Choice'? 'Choosy Mothers Choose Jif'?" he quipped. "I don't know what we do about these politically charged attempts to insert the abortion issue into every bill."
Jordan defended the move.
"This should have been law a long time ago," he said. "It's been around six or seven years. We have all kinds of license plates. But somehow we can't do something that's as positive as 'Choose Life' with a couple of smiling kids on it, yet we can have a Smoky the Bear license plate."
Kellie Copeland, a spokesman for NARAL Pro-Choice Ohio, called the action "stealthy."
"They've just totally circumvented the legislative process in order to avoid conflict with a prominent member of their caucus," she said. "And the state will spend a lot of money to defend this bill." She said similar measures have been legally challenged in other states.
"Choose Life" is among a growing list of politically charged issues being placed on license plates. Last week, Ohio lawmakers approved tags plugging the National Rifle Association, for example.
Toby Hoover, director of the Ohio Coalition Against Gun Violence, said she found herself in the ironic position of supporting the bill. Hoover's group fought against the NRA last year in the debate over a bill allowing most Ohioans to carry concealed weapons.
"I am a bit astonished, given the strong opposition of the NRA to registering gun owners," she said. "But soon we'll know who has the guns by the license plates on their cars."
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Posted by Editor at December 7, 2004 09:09 PM
