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Why Republicans Should Oppose Term Limits
Today, Rep. Ron DeSantis (R-Fla.) introduced a bill that would impose a six-year term limit on members of the House, while Senators would be held to 12 years in office. This is a magnificently stupid idea.
I worked on Capitol Hill for eight years back in the ’90s and early 2000s. I came into the job right before the 1994 elections and saw the incoming Republican majority as an opportunity for me and my ilk to do our part to re-make a Constitutional government. Like most Republican staffers on the Hill, I was bright, but young and laughingly inexperienced. As a result, I got my rear kicked day after day by my Democrat counterparts.
You see, Republican staffers on Capitol Hill see the job as a stepping stone to bigger and more lucrative careers, whether it be as a lobbyist or, more often, somewhere else in the private sector. They serve in the office for a few years and then head off for greener pastures. But a Democrat staffer sees the job as the culmination of their mission in life. They love cultivating the government leviathan of their wildest dreams, and you’d have to pry their jobs from their cold, dead hands. When it comes to negotiating bills or working a bill through the system, experienced Democrat staffers know all the tricks and look at unproven Republican staff as raw meat to be chewed up and spit out.
Why does this matter? Look to my home state of California for the answer. It’s a horribly run state and the blame falls squarely on term limits. Voters passed a proposition that limits members’ services to a total of 12 years in either house, or a combination of the two. As a result, members of our Senate and especially the Assembly are often green and rely too heavily on their staff for guidance and advice. These professional staffers are glad to fill the knowledge void left when more experienced members are forced to retire. In that case, you can count on Democrat “lifer staff” to beat Republican “stepping stone” staff every time.
If you want the federal government to far further into dysfunction, go ahead, copy California. Leave the running of the country to wizened old Democrat staffers who know how to win the game every time. I know term limits seems like a great idea, but it just doesn’t work in practice.
Published in Politics
Actually, it doesn’t matter. We get the government we deserve. America deserves to rot in it’s own filth. There’s no reason for anyone to be honest or accountable.
I’ll just grab my popcorn.
Then put in term limits for staffers too. When a candidate loses or is termed out, so does the staff go as well. Put it into the US Code if necessary.
If absolute power leads to absolute corruption, then so does unending power. This goes for rulers and top functionaries as well. Clean them out. All of them. And none of this crap about “People who know how to get things done”. We either have a government of the people, or we do not. If you think it takes permanent staffers and politicians that are in office for 40 years to run things, then lets just call the country what it really is… an oligarchy… knock off the patriotic nonsense, and call it a day.
I’m sympathetic, but someone has to draw the lines Even when assigned to a computer, someone has to program the machine. If you can find a decent, however imperfect, mechanism, then you can count me 100%.
The boundaries initiative failed in 2014 because of petition issues; it’s being brought forward again for 2016. Even though it wouldn’t go into effect until 2020 (the next time districts are drawn), I think it’s got a pretty good chance to make it onto the ballot. I can’t see term limits passing the super-majorities in the House and Senate.
On another matter, there was a vote today in the House on a proposal to cut $1.5 billion from the 2016 Medicaid budget. Every Democrat voted “no”, and every Republican voted “present”. Not much of a profile in courage from the GOP, and not a ringing endorsement of a governor of their own party.
Give a maximum number of lines that can be used.
If that’s the case, why aren’t you leading a revolution?
Seconded.
I think this might be a case where ideas are good in some situations, but not worth it in others. With a relatively small bureaucracy, they’d likely be a good idea. With a big one, they’d probably do more harm than good.
Short version: not worth the effort under current circumstances.
I’d join one.
Term limits would possibly be useful. More useful would be a change in how Congress is staffed. It does not matter whom is elected, from wherever in the country: for the most part staffing is drawn from a pool within the Beltway community that rotates through agencies, lobbying firms, and congressional offices. Staff personnel live in communities where they shop in the same places, they attend PTA meetings together, they are completely isolated from constituents that do not live in their communities.
The same thing applies at the State level. Potential solution: staffs are drawn from States, or Districts. Each member of Congress gets one assistant that is there to deal with scheduling and, potentially, bail. All remaining staff must live and work within the constituent communities, insulated from K Street and the federal agencies. Instantly, lobbying, by agencies and K Street, becomes diffused.
The teams I work with, all over the country and sometimes the world, produce complex products from our remote locations. And we compete, location vs. location, in producing our best. In this, more dispersed environment, we both work with one another, and compete against each other.
Term limits may be useful, but the real problem is the professional class mired in the vicinity of the Beltway, or near our State capitals, that is catalytic and always remains, after every electoral change.
Legislative staffs must be isolated from our capitals and housed in our constituencies. No other change will have the impact of that single change.
Steve Jobs was fired from Apple just a few years after Apple really broke big with the Mac. They went public in 81, and he was fired in 85. He was 30. NeXT was a huge failure, going from a being a very public challenge to Apple on its own turf, to selling off most of their physical assets and becoming a software-only shop with a much reduced customer base. When he got his second chance at Apple, he was nearly the polar opposite as a CEO than he had been in his early Apple days. Gone was the pirate nonsense. Jobs turned Apple 2.0 into the Navy.
Had he never gotten that chance… had Apple bought BeOS instead of NeXT… Jobs would likely be remembered today as a highly eccentric but charismatic failure. His name would have been synonymous with “How not to run a company”. Fortunately… for him… he had that reality distortion field. Jobs could sell cigarettes to a cancer ward.
I completely agree with your disagreement Simon Templar. California is hardly the socialist mess it is because of term limits. How about unchecked importation of a ready made underclass that comes from a region of the world with a proclivity for Leftist politics?
Aren’t congressional staffers employees of the elected official? So if their elected official gets voted out, don’t they lose their job? Which would mean if there was term limits wouldn’t the staffers be term limited?
I agree with Chris Johnson. A congress person’s staff should mostly be back in the district, not in DC. In DC a congress person probably only needs two staffers one that is in the office all the time taking calls, and a page that follows them around.
The only thing term limits have accomplished in California is to cause the politicians to shuffle from job to job. For example, our once and current governor, Jerry Brown, has (over the last couple of decades) been Mayor of Oakland and State Attorney General (when not running for President, of course).
The only thing worse than a career politician is a career politician who keeps taking new jobs that he has no idea how to perform.
And thus my X number of years in government and you are out proposal. Shuffle all they want after so many years, elected, not elected, they are gone.
Term limits would reduce the power of an elected official to reward his supporters with public largesse. Why do they support the Harry Reids of the world? Because he will almost certainly be there for many years to repay their support many times over. Why will he be there so long? Because they are supporting him. This is the most serious corruption that a lack of term limits allows to flourish.
Why do certain senators always support sugar subsidies? Teachers’ unions? Every other interest? They do what they must to get reelected. That is not necessarily what is good for the public, but what is good for voting blocs.
Term limits reduces the pernicious influence of seniority. Why should Harry Reid, perhaps the most evil man ever to serve in American government (and I include Aaron Burr) gain so much power because of his longevity?
Elections by themselves are not the answer. There are some incumbents who are defeated, but almost never in the primary. (That’s why Eric Cantor’s defeat is so stunning.) And since the vast majority of seats are comfortable Democratic or Republican strongholds, incumbency is a virtual lock in most seats. It is not good enough to say that the electorate can vote them out. They don’t get the chance. And even if they did, they are not interested in voting out someone who betrayed the national interest in favor of local interests.
Everybody says that and then they don’t turn the bad guys out.
I disagree. I think term limits are very much needed. I propose a total of 12 years total, each house. And while we are at it…how about changing the House to 4 year terms? It will save money and time and let these Reps spend more time running the government than running for office.
No one needs to be a career politician.
Everybody says that and then they don’t turn the bad guys out.
Perhaps because there are varying opinions on who the bad guys are.
The elections argument (i.e., elections are themselves a kind of term limit) is proven false by the need for term limits on the presidency. Why not just say, “Vote him out if you don’t want to keep him there forever?”
The power of incumbency is so strong there that we could end up with a dictator. Obama has made this clearer than anyone else that I know of who has been in the office.
The elections argument (i.e., elections are themselves a kind of term limit) is proven false by the need for term limits on the presidency. Why not just say, “Vote him out if you don’t want to keep him there forever?”
You assume presidential term limits are a good idea.
Without them the tendency to dictatorship is too great. The dictator must retain power so that his enemies do not punish him once he is removed. With definite term limits the executive knows he will relinquish power, and therefore must act so as to avoid making blood enemies.
I wish Kansas could be redrawn. Put a circle around Wichita, Topeka, Kansas City, and Lawrence. Divide the rest of the state to give it an equal number of representatives as the large, uber-liberal cities. No more holding the rural areas hostage, forcing the city views on an unwilling group. Do this in other states. Upper New York state would no longer be prisoners of New York City, Denver would lose a lot of power, etc. Why should we all be held against our will by ‘representatives’ who really don’t represent US?
Without them the tendency to dictatorship is too great. The dictator must retain power so that his enemies do not punish him once he is removed. With definite term limits the executive knows he will relinquish power, and therefore must act so as to avoid making blood enemies.
We survived without such term limits and were dictatorship-free for over 150 years.
Because until FDR everyone accepted the Washington rule of two terms.
No country has a dictator until they have one. Rome had a republic for 400 years until Sulla and Caesar installed themselves as dictators.
Would you vote to revoke term limits so that Obama could run again? I wouldn’t. If he could run again ad infinitum there is no telling what he would do to smooth his own reelection, including admitting millions of likely Democratic voters, and issuing executive orders that trample on the separation of powers inherent in the Constitution for the benefit of his favored groups (e.g., unions) and his radical progressive ideology.
Term-limit bureaucrats, too. Send the carpetbaggers packing.
We survived without Presidential term limits until FDR broke the tradition and hung around after his sell-by date. After FDR, Republicans and Democrats both agreed to place limits on Presidential terms.
When I look at the mess Obama has made, both at home and abroad, I thank God for the Twenty-second Amendment.
Term limit staffers? Is this not obvious to you?
At the very least limit the amount of staffers you can have and the number who work for the committees. It’s not just Congressmen who have staffers. The committees themselves have staffers. You cut down the number of staffers to, say, three per Rep/Senator and you have zero staffers for the committees and you will cut down the size of bills and probably have more engaged representation.
The joy of seeing Chuck Schumer term limited offsets any of your arguments. ;)
Klaatu:Without them the tendency to dictatorship is too great. The dictator must retain power so that his enemies do not punish him once he is removed. With definite term limits the executive knows he will relinquish power, and therefore must act so as to avoid making blood enemies.
We survived without such term limits and were dictatorship-free for over 150 years.
Because until FDR everyone accepted the Washington rule of two terms.
No country has a dictator until they have one. Rome had a republic for 400 years until Sulla and Caesar installed themselves as dictators.
Would you vote to revoke term limits so that Obama could run again? I wouldn’t. If he could run again ad infinitum there is no telling what he would do to smooth his own reelection, including admitting millions of likely Democratic voters, and issuing executive orders that trample on the separation of powers inherent in the Constitution for the benefit of his favored groups (e.g., unions) and his radical progressive ideology.
I would much rather have an Obama worried about being reelected than one unencumbered by such concerns. He held off on the executive amnesty until after the mid-terms because he feared an electoral backlash. The 22nd Amendment cleared the way for him afterward. There is a reason Madison and all did not include term limits in the Constitution, they understood human nature. A representative with no need to be concerned with reelection will naturally look forward and help those who will help him after his term is through.