In California in the 80’s the most powerful politician was not the Governor but was Speaker of the House, Willie Brown. Short story was through the citizen initiative process terms limits were set and Willie Brown was out.
This report while brief shows a net positive to the workings of the CA Assembly including what I perceive to be this important outcome
…….that term limits will eliminate these old career politicians, bringing fresh blood into the legislature.
I read through what I could of the MA Constitution to see if the citizen initiative process prohibited this or required that it be a constitutional amendment to change terms of service and was left with a mixed opinion trying to read 18th century language ( would welcome further review of this ) but assuming it is just a statue and not an amendment, my proposal would be 8 years Max for each Representative or Senate terms or State wide officeholder in the Commonwealth. Speaker ship or President of the Senate limited to 4 years.
One argument against this is it could open the door for lobbyist to gain more influence by being the ones who could “Show the new guy the ropes” so as a counter balance to this the open meeting laws that requires public disclosure of all deliberations public or private on matters before elected officials be expanded to require all communication with lobbyist be reported publicly or allow recording of same.
A bit more on campaign finance reform wouldn’t hurt but hopefully this new crop of Politicians would be interested in reforming that problem if the spot light on lobbyist is a bit brighter.
Discussions on BMG often range over what can we the citizen do. I believe the 16 year run of GOP Governors and the attraction of Deval as well as the high rate of independent voters in MA is linked to the Reality perception of too much power concentrated in the hands of to few and this is one possible avenue to solving that problem.
Food for thought…
A constitutional amendment would be required. That’s been tried, with, well, at best limited success.
…not impossible. Different climate after the 16 years of GOP Govs, Finneran, Bulger , DeMasi and Deval than in 1992. A lot more outside of 128 frustration to deal with. This is what Deval tapped into even if he hasn’t handled using it well to affecting change.
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p>The upcoming petition to remove the State’s personal income tax could be a bit of temperature taking of frustration with Beacon Hill. (Not that I believe they would ever accept that vote.
and elect judges;
and havetaxpayer funded campaign financing;
and make legislators part-timers (small stipened only);
and require all legislation goes to full vote;
and require legislative sessions meet outside on nice days;
and no rules apply when legislation must be passed (like mandatory highly explicit sex education stuff;
and no rules apply when legislation must be defeated (like charter school funding)
and no Beacon Hill parking spaces for legislators;
and if legislator or governor is good, they get to run again regardless of term limits.
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p>Ahh, then everything would be right with the world.
How about making it much harder to get re-elected? Like, not allowing an incumbent to campaign, or raise campaign funds.
I would say that this is a bad idea.
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p>It did not end gridlock: California has failed to pass an on time budget every year since term limits went into effect.
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p>It did not get rid of career politicians: They just need to move around more. Willie Brown, the DiMasi of California, became Mayor of San Fransisco. Others simply just changed what house they were in: State Senators ran for Assembly seats, Assemblymen ran for State Senate. Once their terms are up there they just find something else to run for. Ambitious State Senator Tom McClintock is running for an open seat in the California 4th District, even though it’s over 400 miles from the Suburban LA Senate Seat he currently represents.
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p>Political Hacks are still in control: California’s 2000 redistricting was one of the worst in the nation, but was unique in the sense that it was bipartisan. Every seat in the assembly, the state senate and congress was designed to be either Safe Democrat or Safe Republican so no one would face a competitive reelection fight ever. Only one congress seat (out of 53) has changed hands since, and that was in large part due to changing demographics in that district.
Things seem to be moving quickly enough, even if not in the direction that our part-time governor wishes.
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p>We seem to be a couple months away from proposals to outright dismiss the legislature.
… the nerve of cynicism with the comments coming from this post:)
I’m just amazed at the support for efforts to change the system so Deval doesn’t suck so bad. Maybe nobody over 5-8 tall should be allowed to occupy elected office.
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p>Considering how quickly a state Secretary of Education went from idea to reality, it’s clear the Lege can move fleetingly if so inclined…
They’re called elections.
.. do they work so badly. As noted elsewhere in this thread gerrymandering creates unlimited terms rather that the intended term limits. And last time I checked I don’t get to vote in DeMasi’s district but he gets to control what happens in mine. Actually we have a long serving GOP incumbent good old boy who keeps winning by the conservatism of the other towns in the district so I’ve got more incentive to push this.
If you ask most people, they like their own representative or senator. It’s always the other 159 reps or 39 senators that folks have a problem with.
Forcing people to vote for someone other than who they want isn’t very democratic.
…you limit the power and term of the Speaker, but not rank and file legislators. We should have a nonpartisan commission or a computer draw district lines and require that municipal boundaries be followed as much as population allows. For example, Chelmsford should not be divided into four House districts. The other argument against term limits is that experience is good. In no other business would we say for example, “Sorry Doctor, I don’t want you operating on me; you’ve already had your eight years practiving medicine,” or “Sorry Counselor, I’ don’t want you representing me in Court; you’ve already practiced law for eight years.” It’s absurd.
Yes, elections allow for new blood to enter the race but do we really believe that at the end of the day the power of incumbency means nothing? From Boston Globe in 2006-
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p>And really, are we getting what we pay for? Sure they can get re-elected and of course MY elected official is fantastic but the other legislators managed to pass 230 bills in 2007 many of which were so specific that they have absolutely no bearing on the way the state functions.
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p>Things like naming roads and bridges. Bills that exempt a particular plot of land in the town of Neverneverland. Authorizing a new alcolhol permit in a particular town. Sick leave for a particular employee, easements, leases, and more.
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p>Now I’m not knocking Chapter 114 of the Acts of 2007, An act relative to brain aneurysm awareness month, but it seems to me that we should expect more out of our elected officials. If they’re not doing the job, and we’ve been at this system for quite some years now, perhaps it is time to jiggle the handle and install term limits.
The problem is that there are a few too many bad career politicians, the solution isn’t getting rid of the good ones. It does take experience to run government, experienced legislators can be a boon, especially when it’s so tough to elect the good ones we’ve fought so hard for.
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p>No, the answer lies in public financing. That will allow many challengers who don’t come from the special interests to run strong campaigns, and it’ll allow people of limited means to have a fair shot. Most importantly, it’ll expand the power of the grassroots – the foundation of any good democracy – while freeing up candidates’ time to talk to their citizen constituents, instead of spending hours a day on the phone to raise money.
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p>Sorry, can you explain why grassroots is the foundation of any good democracy?
Prior to the late 1970s, there were 240 members of the House of Representatives. Perhaps it’s time to reconsider undoing the so-called “House Cut.”
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p>For one, more districts means smaller districts. Right now each district has about 40,000 residents. Going back to 240 would decrease the size of the districts to about 26,667. As it is right now, representative districts are small enough that an enterprising candidate can knock on just about every door, and make contact with a good portion of the voters. Decreasing the size of the district makes it that much easier to run a grass roots campaign. The importance of money to a campaign decreases the smaller the district. Quite simply, if you could speak one on one with a voter several times, or send them glossy mailings, which would you do? What do you think makes a better impression on voters?
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p>Mathematically, it would be tougher for the Speaker to corral 121 members than it is to corral 81 members. More representatives means more mouths to feed for the Speaker. There are only so many leadership positions and nice offices to dole out; a Speaker keeps control over a small house and the rank-and-file members with the promise that someday, they too might get a leadership position, if they cooperate with the Speaker. By increasing the size of the house, it inherently becomes less likely that any given individual member will ascend to the leadership. Once that happens, there will be a larger percentage of the membership who aren’t in thrall to the Speaker.
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p>One of the unintended consequences of the House Cut is that the larger sizes of the district meant that the Representatives needed staff to help them respond to constituent requests. And offices to house the staff. Before the House Cut, most representatives didn’t have any staff, and few had offices.
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p>One suggestion that gets thrown around every so often is that we should go back to the old concept of a part-time legislature, with part-time pay for the legislators. The problem with that, is that other than attorneys, very few people would be able to take time off from a full-time job to attend legislative sessions and committee hearings. We’d end up with a House full of lawyers, independently wealthy people, and a smattering of retirees. Not very diverse. The salary for representatives should be high enough so that an ordinary person could support a family on it.
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p>IMHO this is a better solution than public campaign financing. I don’t want my money going to promote things I disagree with. I’d hate to see some John-Howard-type guy using my money to print up flyers with his spam and egg sperm and egg foolishness or- worse.
I like this idea. We can learn a thing or two from our neighbors to the north. The New Hampshire House is one of the most “representative” legislative bodies in the world, by which I mean each Rep has a very small number of constituents. They have 400 state reps for a population of 1.2 million, so each representative has 3000 constituents.
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p>I’m not necessarily suggesting we go quite that far, but it’s not a bad idea either. How many people do you suppose are on a first-name basis with their Representative? I suspect the quality of democracy would only grow if that number grew.
I did a very unscientific review of election dates on the web and it seems that there was a 30% turnover in the House in the past 5 years, and that doesn’t count the seats that are opening up this year.