After Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s four term presidency 1933-1945, the 22nd
Amendment to the constitution passed into law what had previously only been
convention: that Presidents should serve no more than two terms. Some
Constitutional experts and many advocates of a strong executive continue to
press for the Amendment’s repeal.The rule has an immensely important effect on
the US political environment - and, given the strength of that nation, on the global
community. Whilst circumstances - Eisenhower’s age, Kennedy’s assassination,
Vietnam’s affect on Johnson, Nixon’s fall, Reagan’s age, Clinton’s scandals have meant that a strong second term president has not yet been stopped from
running again by it, it is surely only a matter of time before such a situation
occurs. The U.S. model has also been very influential worldwide, prompting
many countries with presidential systems to adopt similar term limits and
increasing this debate’s international significance.[This debate should not
become a discussion of the qualities of FDR’s presidency, which would clearly be
specialist knowledge. If readers are interested, in relation to this debate, I would
hold it to be of moot value in any case: the great benefits of his term - the Social
Security Act, a fairer (federal) taxation system, the breaking of the private utilities
domination - were brought at the price of executive dominance of the legislature
and attempts to reform the Supreme Court in order to ensure judicial support for
his program. But this is a debate about the principle of term limits on the highest
executive office.]
The two-term limit is undemocratic. If Americans
want to vote for a President again after two terms,
and that President is willing to serve, why should
their wishes automatically be denied? The two-term
convention was seized upon by a coalition of
senators who wanted more power for themselves (by
undermining the Presidency), FDR haters and
presidential aspirants who wanted to ensure regular
turnover at the top. There is no logical basis for this
limitation beyond that. The effect of this scheming is
damaging: it denies Americans the chance to vote for
a candidate they might want to support. This
amendment limits voter choice.
The Presidency is different from almost any other
kind of office in the US. Senators and Congressmen
don’t have term limits because their voices are
balanced by opposition in their respective chambers;
the President has no comparable counterbalance.
The nearest analogy would be with state governors many of which have term limits, too. This is because
the role of the individual in such ‘head of executive’
functions is of such importance that pure democracy
- unlimited terms - must be tempered by the fear of
‘elective dictatorship’ - a strong President using the
undoubted advantages of incumbency to win election
after election. America’s beginnings are based in a
rejection of monarchy and of cronyism: the 22nd
Amendment stops this from coming about by other
means.
A strong executive is important for both philosophical
and practical reasons. Philosophically, a strong
executive is desirable as a motor for change and an
efficient response to changing times The 22nd
Amendment imbalances government in the
legislature’s favour. In practical terms, term limits
weren’t accidentally omitted from the constitution the Founding Fathers considered, debated and
rejected them. This is because the prospect of future
Term limits didn’t have to be mentioned in the
Constitution because from Washington onwards the
convention of two term maximum Presidencies was
respected; only when it was broken did a rule need
to be put in place. The President’s strength is
dependent upon many things - personal popularity,
his relationship with his party, which party controls
Congress, events abroad, etc: the potential of a
third term is inferior to all of these as a tool for
tenure gives the Presidency leverage to get things
done. Without that, Presidential terms suffer the
lame duck effect, in which a President is less and
less able to force his legislative agenda: for
example, after Eisenhower’s overwhelming win in
1956, Congressional Republicans increasingly
ignored his leadership despite his fresh and powerful
mandate. The limit effectively denies the choice
voters have made of coming to practical fruition: the
status quo undermines second term presidents.
times of national or international crisis, continuity
and experience can be vital. Electorates can
recognise this - hence FDR’s third and fourth term
wins during the Second World War. The 22nd
Amendment automatically denies the possibility of
democratically approved continuity. This is
particularly worrying given that thousands of jobs in
the executive branch of government change hands
every time a new President is elected, something
which is not so common in the civil service of other
countries. The opposition must show why the idea of
continuity in a crisis is less important than the
principle of a two-term limit.
Some policies require long term leadership to ensure
their success, over a long period of time: for
example, FDR’s post-depression social reforms,
‘The New Deal.’ If those policies are ones voters
support, why deny them the chance of continuous
development?
making others help the presidential program. In any
case, the power of potential future office primarily
draws its strength from potential patronage - a
nepotistic consideration which, though inevitable,
should not be credited with such importance that a
third term should be allowed to encourage it.
Since the end of the Second World War, the CIA
and the White House administration have
conducted bipartisan briefings for presidential
candidates of both parties, irrespective of the
incumbent’s allegiance, to ensure continuity. The
actual presence of the same individual is far less
important than the knowledge and understanding
this scheme guarantees. The ‘have experience or
not have experience’ challenge presented is a false
dichotomy.
If these are policies voters really support, then the
party the President belongs to can continue them. If
they are so weak that only the charisma of a
particular President can see them through the
legislative process, then perhaps it is right that they
fall.