rotation in office

This morning I was listening to Brian Sullivan and Dagen McDowell argue about President Obama's guidelines for executive compensation and the billions in bonuses paid in the various firms that received TARP funds. During the course of his tirade Brian mentioned term limits. His remark was in passing, but it reminded me of the issue – a frequent subject of debate in my family.

While I have always been in favor of term limits, I have also inevitably succumbed to the "people deserve to elect whomever they want to represent them" argument. No longer. It has reached the point where the logic of "they are all bad; other than my representative" is hurting us all. In fact, we passed that point years ago.

In 1947 the United States Congress passed the 22^nd Amendment which sets a term limit for the President. It was ratified by the requisite number of states in 1951. The text of the Amendment reads as follows:

Section 1. 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. But this article shall not apply to any person holding the office of President when this article was proposed by the Congress, and shall not prevent any person who may be holding the office of President, or acting as President, during the term within which this article becomes operative from holding the office of President or acting as President during the remainder of such term.

In essence, the Amendment prohibits anyone from serving as President for more than 10 years (two elected four-year terms after succeeding to the Presidency for two years). Historically speaking, this Amendment only codifies what had been accepted convention, although some presidents did seek a third term.

In 1880 President Grant was the first to seek a third term, eschewing the two-term principle. Then, in 1912, Teddy Roosevelt sought election to a third term (although it would have been his second elected term and those two terms would have been non-consecutive). Finally, Franklin D. Roosevelt was elected to a third term in 1940 and then a fourth term in 1944.

Although the practice of rotation in office, what we now call term limits, dates back to ancient Greece and was addressed in the Articles of Confederation, it was omitted from the U.S. Constitution. American culture of the day, however, perceived political power as corrupting and believed in civic duty. Essentially, these cultural beliefs proscribed returning incumbent representatives to office.

It seems American culture has changed since 1776, especially in the last 100 years.