Thoughts on Term Limits
I believe that it is apparent that the Founding Fathers felt no need to have term limits for any of the three branches of the federal government. They were initially very clear that the President should be elected for a term of four years, senators for a term of six years, and representatives for terms of two years. There was very little discussion of running for repeated terms of office. The subject wasn’t even broached until the 1940’s when it seemed to many in both major political parties that President Roosevelt was coming too close to becoming a dictator and forcing the other party permanently out of office. Indeed, the 22d Amendment was added to the Constitution in 1947 because of President Roosevelt’s extended presidency of three and a half terms, the first ever to presume to hold that office for more than two terms. Since that time, term limits have been imposed on our country’s chief executive.
No person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice, and no person who has held the office of President, or acted as President, for more than two years of a term to which some other person was elected President shall be elected to the office of the President more than once.
It’s time to extend a similar restriction on both houses of Congress.
The Founding Fathers seemed to believe almost idealistically that all political offices in this country would be temporary positions held by citizens for a brief time. They would be patriots who would then return to their professions and jobs and make room for new blood to volunteer to lead. What an altruistic concept! Sadly, that idealism has been overrun since that time by individuals seemingly intent on creating a new political class of individuals who would make elected office their lifelong pursuit. We need term limits in the U.S. House and Senate today for somewhat different reasons than those that impacted the Executive branch in the forties, but needed they are.
I recognize that there are many reasonable voices opposed to such limits. These individuals often cite reasons such as:
1. Being able to hold seats for an extended period of time gives senators and representatives a chance to build influence and get more accomplished.
2. Implementing term limits almost seems unconstitutional, as they would deprive voters from voting for whomever they want on an ongoing basis if, in voters’ eyes, they were already doing a good job.
3. Such an imposition would most likely require a Constitutional Amendment, such as the 22nd cited above. Such a process is time consuming, arduous, and likely to fail because of the lack of political party agreement.
4. Knowing that a politician is at the end of their tether and cannot be reelected or voted out of office may encourage the unscrupulous merely to vote for legislation that enhances their reputation, business interests, or pad golden parachutes in their final terms, not serve the best interests of the country.
5. Some programs take several years to develop. We need experienced politicians to work the process through the complex political system to enact legislation.
6. New members may not have the necessary experience to pass legislation and lack institutional memory as to what has previously been effective or even tried. They may lack the gravitas to create a political consensus.
7. Elected officials in their final terms of office may lack the incentive to listen to their constituents.
8. Term limits by their very existence prejudice the most experienced politicians; and
9. We already have the mechanism to remove ineffective members of both the Senate and the House of Representatives. It is called elections every six years for the Senate and every two years for the House.
All that being considered, I believe there are sound reasons to impose term limits on both House and Senate members.
1. History shows the longer members are in these two legislative bodies the more tax money legislators spend and the higher the taxes legislators impose on others. With time comes power and with power comes arrogance and too often an “I know better than you” attitude. Politicians tend to think of the money they are spending as the government’s money, not your hard-earned tax money.
2. Without term limits we get an increasingly aged group of legislators when the majority of issues they legislate on deal with those in working groups, representing ages from 18-60. According to Pew Research, the median age of the current crop of senators is 65.3 and that of the House membership 57.9. Despite these relatively low medians, 14 legislators currently serving are 80 years or older. We have several octogenarians+ such as Diane Feinstein (93 when she passed), Maxine Waters (85), Chuck Grassley (90), Napolitano (86), Eleanor Holmes (86), Steny Hoyer (84), Nancy Pelosi (83), Bill Pascal 86), Hal Rogers (85), Jim Clyburn (83) Mitch McConnell (81), and Bernie Sanders (82). These are powerful individuals who can often hold up legislation based on their tenure and influence, when bills are otherwise desired by younger members. We see episodes of freezing on camera and frequent stammering, forgetfulness, and zoning out. We can’t afford that. Those we elect must be coherent and aware of the critical issues facing other Americans on a daily basis, not living in a prestigious-looking, highly- protected, senior citizen home in the nation’s capitol, divorced from the economic and scientific issues of the day. One can become accustomed to speaking of billions and trillions of dollars while not even knowing the price of milk or a dozen eggs. Age itself is not the issue, although such ages and extended tenure ensure that these individuals have never held jobs outside of political office and hence, can be grossly out of touch with ordinary working Americans not in such a protected class.
3. The longer members serve, the greater the chances of corruption.
4. Imposing term limits encourages new members with different ideas to enter the bodies. With changing technologies impacting everything from artificial intelligence to space exploration to national defense, to the rise of a world power such as China, the insertion of new ideas and new approaches to leadership are critical. Self-driving cars may sound like a great idea in Washington DC when commuting from a mansion in Georgetown or the Downtown Hilton to Congress, but those blue collar workers in Indiana and throughout the United States know they are bad ideas whose time has not come. A technology as simple as Emotional Intelligence, that has impacted the leadership of every major business in North America is simply unheard of in the Halls of Congress.
5. The Founding Fathers never envisioned those serving in Congress to be a protected professional class. Yet they exempt themselves from virtually every restrictive legislation they pass.
Considering all of the pros and cons cited above, and having myself served a short stint in Washington when working as a professional staff person in the U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Senate, I have seen firsthand how easy it is to feel as though Washington is a separate enclave from the rest of the country. The DC cocktail circuit is a powerful social network, and the longer one serves in that city, the more such inclusion is considered a right not a privilege. That arrogance must end, and imposing term limits for those serving in Congress will be a great step forward. Service is a word that seems to have gone out of vogue in our professional lives, but it is a word that should guide all of our politicians. Mandatory term limits will encourage younger professionals to leave their jobs and professions for a short stint of public service, thereby emboldening the idea of national service.
The argument against imposing term limits says our federal voting mechanism is more than adequate to ensure that those individuals in Congress who deserve reelection will receive it, and those who don’t will be replaced, has lost all legitimacy in the last several years. The high cost of running campaigns and party control have both worked against change. While voters often claim that Congress is out of control” or that laws are being enacted that infringe on personal liberties, it is always some other “generic” senator or representative, never theirs who is at fault. For that reason, the reelection rates for the last several elections overwhelmingly favor the incumbents. The disparity becomes obvious when observing that the average incumbent reelection rate is 90-98% while the Congressional approval rating hovers around 15%. It’s always some other senator or representative who is at fault, not mine. The fact is our elections have proven themselves to be inadequate to ensure ineffective or outright incompetent individuals are removed and are replaced by new, more effective, individuals.
Such an approach to governing will not be easy to achieve. Historically when attempts at establishing term limits were floated the initiative failed because of a pervasive political divide, with republicans generally favoring such legislation and democrats opposed. We must return to a process of governance based on the good of the country. Yes, I know—easier said than done. That is precisely why we need new blood infused into the House and Senate. After all, the only persons who can vote in such legislation or start the process of amending our Constitution are the very people whom it will impact. Should the establishment of term limits be on the table, those currently in office will be the very individuals who will be voting themselves out of office—out of jobs—not a likely scenario. Such a change will not be easy to achieve.
We must rethink the whole process of seniority. Who gets what committee leadership jobs, etc., is currently determined solely by power and time in service. We must be clear about how many continuous terms of office are appropriate for members of both the Senate and the house. We should take into consideration how to grandfather current members of Congress who have already served one or two terms of office. How will a current member get credit for such past service or will a current member’s past time of service be held against them in curtailing their stints. These are not easy questions and the longer one has served the more likely that person will be opposed to a limitation on their “careers.” It will therefore be up to new members entering the House and Senate to be the vanguard in promoting such critical innovation efforts like enacting term limits. I’ll take on that challenge.
As your candidate from the 5th district, I have already signed the term limits pledge and when elected as your representative will work tirelessly to foster a structure of mandatory term limits for all members of Congress. It is always simplistic to say that such and such is what the Founders intended, but I believe in this case it is clearly responsible to say again that our Founding Fathers never expected a senator’s or representative’s service to be a lifetime position or special class of elected officials, but a time of voluntary temporary service to our nation. That is that attitude I will take to Congress.