Say Anything Blog

And good on them for it, though the likelihood of any such amendment to the constitution passing seems slim given that even many of the Republicans who ran on the “Contract with America” platform in the 1990’s broke their own promises on term limits.

Washington (CNN) - A handful of Republican senators have proposed a Constitutional amendment to limit the amount of time a person may serve in Congress.

Currently, there are no term limits for federal lawmakers, but Sen. Jim DeMint, R-South Carolina, and several of his colleagues are advocating that service in the Senate be limited to 12 years, while lawmakers would only be allowed to serve 6 years in the House.

“Americans know real change in Washington will never happen until we end the era of permanent politicians,” DeMint said in a statement released by his office. “As long as members have the chance to spend their lives in Washington, their interests will always skew toward spending taxpayer dollars to buyoff special interests, covering over corruption in the bureaucracy, fundraising, relationship building among lobbyists, and trading favors for pork – in short, amassing their own power.”

Two-thirds of the House and Senate would need to approve the amendment - a stumbling block that short-circuited the idea 14 years ago. The new proposal echoes the Citizen Legislature Act, part of the original Contract with America proposed by Republicans before they won control of Congress in 1994. That measure, which would have allowed both senators and members of the House to serve just 12 years, won a majority in the Republican-controlled House in 1995, but failed because it did not meet the constitutionally-required two-thirds threshold.

There was a time when I was skeptical about term limits.  I looked at some of the good people we have in Congress - people I admire like Rep. Jeff Flake and Senator Tom Coburn - and I worry that term limits would simply drive the good guys out of office.  And I also felt that Americans should be able to vote for who they want.  If they want to keep sending the same Senator to Washington DC over and over again, I thought, that’s their choice.

But now I’m convinced that term limits aren’t just a good idea but a necessary idea.  I’m not sure anything would more fundamentally change the status quo in Washington DC than term limits.  No more entrenched incumbents who serve for generations.  No more voters who stumble blindly into their booths to pull the lever for the same recognizable names again and again, year after year.  Let’s confront voters with fresh faces (and hopefully fresh ideas) from time to time.  Let’s shake things up a bit every once in a while.

Let’s inspire a little more competition in our national leadership.  Let’s make these elections less about the people running and more about the ideas they’re espousing.  If voters like the agenda or ideals being furthered by a particular elected leader then let them find another leader who will advance those things to take his place when his term is up.

That, I think, puts the focus on what the politicians stand for as opposed to who they are.

The problem is finding enough politicians in Washington in DC with the humility and the principle to limit their own access to power.