After the results of one of its stranger ballot initiatives, Florida will be revising its state constitution to ban two seemingly unrelated bad habits: fossil-fuel drilling and the use of e-cigarettes in indoor workplaces. With more than 80% of the votes now counted, well over the required 60% of voters said yes to the state’s Amendment 9.
Oil drilling is already not allowed off the coast of Florida, but the constitutional amendment more permanently protects the state’s coasts, wildlife, and tourism industry. Meanwhile, measures to prohibit or limit indoor vaping have been introduced all over the United States, at the advice of health care professionals.
Why lump these two measures together? By bundling individual proposed constitutional changes, Florida’s Constitution Revision Commission can keep the number of amendment ballot initiatives relatively low. Amendment 9 was one of three such amendments whose bundling was challenged in the state Supreme Court. All three prevailed in court, and all three passed on Tuesday.