An interesting discussion on term limits starts on another thread, specifically here.
I remain a firm supporter of term limits, based on the inviolable principle of democracy and voter choice, but I have to admit I’m warming to the idea.
Here’s a list of some long-serving members of Congress. No offense to Ted Stevens, but did Alaska really need him for 40 years?
I don’t think the Founders (not that they’re infallible) envisioned people making a career of Congressional service. Members of the House of Lords do, but not the House of Commons, and so they designed a system without Lords.
Finally, I heard recently that large majorities of both parties support term limits. That surprised me.
My friend says term limits are “giving up.” I tend to agree … but is it time to think about them?
jconway says
I support them for SCOTUS, and Norm Ornstein and other scholars have made a powerful argument for them there.
I support them for the Senate President and Speaker. I support them for big city Mayors (three terms is fine, beyond that you get a Daley), I support increasing the presidential term to 6 years and capping it at 2 (12 years in total, French style). I would expand the length of House service to 3 years but cap it with 6 terms (move up or move out). I wouldn’t cap the Senate, I think for every Ted Stevens you have a Byrd or a Kennedy who have been there forever and have useful institutional memory. And if we torch the filibuster, there has to be something that keeps the body distinctive.
In state legislatures it’s a mixed bad. It was initially a disaster for California, though now it seems to have stabilized and is working. In Maine it seems to have allowed far more young and innovative progressive leaders to take charge, while also limiting the legislatures power against a blowhard like LePage. I’d support them at the House level here since it would weaken the power of that institution and the speaker, and generational turnover happens very infrequently. I also think switching to a unicameral system might make sense, as David Bernstein argued.
Christopher says
Their longevity rightly remove them from political whims and not tempt them to look for their next gig. I understand them for executives and support them for legislative leadership. Unicameral legislatures might be OK since SCOTUS ruled both have to use one-person, one vote apportionment (a decision I disagree with and think they overstepped).
Christopher says
Voters should be able to continue to return representatives who are doing a good job, though maybe more could be done to level the playing field between incumbent and challenger.
Christopher says
I propose we at least consider the following:
Public financing of elections
Fairer districting
Requiring excess campaign funds to be given to the candidate’s party, the government, or charity
Of course, there is something to be said for stability.
scott12mass says
For me I think it’s time to try them. Neither Ted Kennedy or Strom Thurman should have been around for as long as they were. The founders split up the Senate into classes so there would be some institutional experience carried over and you wouldn’t have a whole new group coming in at once.
We do it for the President. Two terms for a Senator, four for a Representative (and they can run for Senate or House if they’ve been in one or the other). If you can’t get your ideas implemented in 8-12 years move over and give someone else a chance.
Entrenchment breeds corruption.
jconway says
Christopher says
He’s already practiced for ten years.
I don’t want that lawyer to take my case – she’s had a firm for 15 years and should find another line of work.
I don’t want that teacher for my child – he’s spent 20 years in the classroom.
etc. etc.
petr says
I think the Founders envisioned the citizenry actually taking prolonged thought to arrive at a choice of representation. That the electorate declines to do this with anything approaching consistency is not an excuse to short circuit the careers of representative no matter how well or ill they are in office.
We just went round and round again on Ballot Initiatives and the problems of a hybrid between direct and representative democracy. The long and the short of my argument there applies just as neatly here: people care oh so much about a veto on the representative by Ballot Initiative precisely and exactly because they don’t give a care to the choice of representative in the first place. Term limits are a way of avoiding or ignoring the simple truth: the electorate isn’t making much of an effort.
If, however, the same amount of care and energy went in to picking the representatives as has gone into, for example, the question of marijuana legality, each and every election, then we wouldn’t need to discuss term limits.
jconway says
Turnout is always higher for open seats, especially for party primaries, and term limits cause more seats to be open and regularly contested more often. They remove many of the built in advantages incumbents have. An incumbent would have to be profoundly bad to lose an election in Massachusetts, especially a primary.
It’s even difficult to unseat incumbent governors and presidents due to the advantages of incumbency and the financial advantages. Term limits help mitigate this by making more seats, more open, more regularly and by preventing incumbents from accruing too much power or influence. You’d have to be as bad as Craig Benson to get booted by the electorate with term limits in place.
Our problems locally and nationally are due to legislatures having too much power, too much influence, and operating too opaquely without serious or even frequent competition. Too often they select the voters instead of the other way around. We have constitutional term limits on just about the only office that likely would be improved if we got rid of them, and no term limits on offices that arguably would be more competitive more often if we did.
petr says
.. .incumbents have (and should have) is the chance to actually be evaluated upon actual performance in the actual job. The statement “an incumbent would have to be profoundly bad” is just another way of saying dire circumstances are the only thing that gets the attention of the electorate. That the electorate isn’t paying enough attention redounds to the incumbents advantage, but that, too, is a fault of an inattentive citizenry and not the incumbent.
centralmassdad says
The problem is not that the legislature has too much power; it is that certain legislators have too much power.
The problem is not that DeLeo is entrenched in his seat as a representative. The problem is that he is entrenched as Speaker, with near-absolute control over what happens, politically, in the Commonwealth. Control that can be exercied almost entirely in the dark, because the only election anyone pays attention to is for governor, and the governor– Dem or Republican– is utterly subject to the whim of the Speaker.
stomv says
I as a voter have no leverage over an elected politician who has chosen to not run for reelection. Maybe he’s running for some other seat some day and voters will have really long memories, but that seems thin.
On the other hand, when the pol knows he’s up for reelection, he knows that he’d better perform constituent service. He’d better listen to the vox populi. He’d better show up, shake babies, kiss hands.
I want politicians who are hungry for votes. Term limited pols aren’t. Rather than subject fewer elected officials to the fervor of the populace, we should focus on subjecting more of them through redistricting reforms, campaign finance reforms, and so forth.
progressivemax says
Check out this article about term limits on Vox
It argues that “Term limits weaken the legislative branch relative to the executive. Governors and the executive bureaucracy are reported to be more influential over legislative outcomes in states where term limits are on the books than where they are not.”
“Term limits also strengthen the power of lobbyists and interest groups … In term-limited states, lawmakers and their staff have less time to build up expertise, since they are there for a limited time. But like the executive agencies of the state government, lobbyists and interest groups are also there year after year.
JimC says
The press, for one.
jconway says
Nearly every major progressive piece of legislation relied on a strong executive corralling a weak legislature. Strong Mayors are able to get a lot more done because the imbalance is baked into the system. A stronger Obama or Deval facing a weakened Speaker and House of Representatives is just fine in my book. And we can’t blame millennials for neglecting the top of the ballot when voting. More Americans know who the president is than could name their state rep, despite the fact that she is more approachable and accountable to the voter. This reform recognizes that and shifts power to where the voter already recognizes it lies.
johntmay says
I mean really, think about it. Senators limited to two terms, maybe three, house members three terms or four terms, all while I and my lobbyist pals have been entrenched in DC for years. WE know all the places, all the connections, all the inside info and WE will be more than happy to show the new kids around….and no matter what WE know that those kids will be gone in a while and WE will still be here, the guides, the power brokers, the inside the beltway rulers.
HOWEVER, if we could solve the lobbyist problem first, then yeah, term limits might be a good idea.
stomv says
Those term limited legislators — their next move might well be lobbying, and that’s more competition for work!
JimC says
I don’t think the argument can be based on lobbyists, because they’re a corrupting force on the system. Since they represent money, money will always retrench and find a way in,
My friend thinks a term limited elected official can be more effective, because he/she can act on their beliefs without worrying about reelection. (Of course the irony is that voters prefer people who do act on their beliefs.)
This discussion always makes me think of Marty Meehan, who made term limits the center of his first campaign, then violated his pledge as soon as it came time, and then LEFT Congress for a better job.
sabutai says
Imagine you’re trying to get a screw into a piece of wood. You can’t find your screwdriver, but know if you pound it with a hammer just right, you might be able to “solve” the problem in an ugly way. That’s what term limits are — the hammer.
Did Alaska need Stevens for that long? I bet there’s someone in Alaska asking if Massachusetts needed Ted Kennedy for that long.
The problem is twofold — politicians pick their districts through politically driven districting, and they can spend as much as they want to stay in office. Both of those are almost unique to the United States among industrialized democracies. There’s a reason for that.
Resolve those two problems with neutral districting commissions, and recognize “free speech” doesn’t mean a billionaire bonus, and you’ll get rid of incumbents coasting when they shouldn’t.
JimC says
As there should be. And in fact neither state needed either man for as long as they served. But they became more valuable partly because the Senate favors seniority. (No insult to either — it’s just that there were other people who could have been Senator.)
I do like the redistricting idea though.
centralmassdad says
By Sen. Kennedy’s sucessor(s).