Political Career
From 1979 to 1980, Blackwell served as Mayor of Cincinnati, Ohio. Earlier, he had been a member of the Cincinnati city council.
One of the first orders of business of Blackwell's administration as mayor of Cincinnati was the establishment of a crowd control task force stemming from the deaths of 11 concert fans at a concert by the British rock group The Who at Riverfront Coliseum on December 3, 1979.
Blackwell was a member of the Charter Party, Cincinnati's third party, which is generally supported by left-leaning voters. However, when he began to consider statewide and national offices, he became a Republican.
Blackwell served in the administration of President George H. W. Bush as undersecretary in the Department of Housing and Urban Development from 1989 to 1990. He returned to Cincinnati to run for the first district seat in the United States House of Representatives being vacated by Tom Luken. Blackwell lost to Luken's son, Charlie Luken, by a narrow 51% to 49% margin. Following his close defeat, President Bush appointed Blackwell ambassador to the United Nations Commission on Human Rights. Blackwell served in that post from 1992 to 1993.
Blackwell was appointed Ohio State Treasurer by then-Gov. George Voinovich in 1994 to complete the term of Mary Ellen Withrow, who was appointed U.S. treasurer by President Bill Clinton. Blackwell was elected treasurer in 1994 and was elected Ohio Secretary of State in 1998. That year, Blackwell considered a run for governor, but Ohio Republican Party chairman Robert T. Bennett persuaded Blackwell to run for secretary of state instead, leaving the governorship open to Bob Taft. Blackwell was national chairman of longtime friend Steve Forbes' presidential campaign in 2000. Blackwell was re-elected secretary of state in 2002.
Blackwell, a strict fiscal and social conservative, has become a vocal critic of the moderate wing of the Ohio Republican Party, including Taft, for adopting tax increases in the face of budget shortfalls in recent years. He has also demanded the resignation of Ohio House of Representatives Speaker Larry Householder, a Republican, whose staff became embroiled in fund-raising scandals.
He was also the most prominent Republican to support adding an amendment to the state constitution to prohibit same-sex marriage. The state's Republican U.S. Senator George Voinovich and then-Senator Mike DeWine opposed the amendment's broad language, fearing it could bar not only same-sex marriage but also civil unions, domestic partnerships, and possibly wills and any legal contracts for homosexuals. Taft later also came out against the amendment, expressing his concern that its ambiguous language would have unintended consequences and leave the state open to a number of lawsuits. During the campaign Blackwell lobbied hard for this measure and was widely credited with attracting many conservative evangelical African Americans to the polls to vote for the measure and for Bush's re-election. The amendment passed with the approval of 61.64% of the voters.
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