Recent Term Limit Debates
- From 1990 to 2000 a total of 19 states set term limits for state legislators, to take effect variously between 1996 and 2008.
- Terms limits on state legislators were subsequently overturned (for technical reasons) in Oregon, and repealed by the legislature in Idaho.
- Twenty-one states approved term limits on members of the U.S. Congress.
- State term limits on federal legislators were challenged in the courts, and in 1995 the U.S. Supreme Court narrowly ruled that states could not impose them on Federal officeholders and only a constitutional amendment could assure them.
- In the 1994 elections Republicans promised a vote on congressional term limits during their successful campaign to win control of Congress, but a constitutional amendment failed to win the necessary votes in 1995.
- That year, both the Senate and the House officially opposed legislation mandating term limits for their members
- In 1997 the House rejected a constitutional amendment requiring term limits.
Source: The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition. 2008. Encyclopedia.com. 14 June 2009 .
- In 1995 Amendment 73 in the Arkansas constitution stated that "The people of Arkansas find and declare that elected officials who remain in office too long become preoccupied with reelection and ignore their duties as representatives of the people. Entrenched incumbency has reduced voter participation and has led to an electoral system that is less free, less competitive, and less representative than the system established by the Founding Fathers. Therefore, the people of Arkansas, exercising their reserved powers, herein limit the terms of the elected officials."
- The Amendment limited the terms for all elected members of the Arkansas House of Representatives, the Arkansas Senate, and any elected member of Arkansas Executive government
- It stated that no elected official in the executive branch of the state government may serve more than two 4 year terms.
- It provides that no member of the Arkansas House of Representatives may serve more than three 2 year terms and no member of the Arkansas Senate may serve more than two 4 year terms.
Source: "U.S. Term Limits, Inc. v. Thornton, 514 U.S. 779 (1995)." Legal Information Institute at Cornell Law School. 14 June 2009
- The Constitution prohibits States from adopting Congressional qualifications in addition to those enumerated in the Constitution. A state congressional term limits amendment is unconstitutional if it has the likely effect of handicapping a class of candidates and "has the sole purpose of creating additional qualifications indirectly." Furthermore, "...allowing individual States to craft their own congressional qualifications would erode the structure designed by the Framers to form a 'more perfect Union.'"
- The court voted 5 for Thornton to 4 for US Term Limits.
Source: "U.S. Term Limits v. Thornton," 514 U.S. 779 (1995), U.S. Supreme Court Case Summary & Oral Argument." The Oyez Project. 14 June 2009
