Posted on 01/06/2013 10:12:27 AM PST by COUNTrecount
A Democratic congressman on Friday yet again introduced a resolution seeking to repeal the 22nd Amendment, thereby removing the limit on how many terms a president may serve in office.
It’s a regular occurrence for longtime Rep. Jose Serrano (D-N.Y.), who has introduced similar legislation every Congress going back at least through 2001.
The 22nd Amendment bars any president from serving more than two full terms in office. It was passed by Congress in 1947 and ratified in 1951 as a reaction to Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s four-term presidency.
Amending the Constitution would require the approval of both the House and Senate and three-fourths of the states.
Democratic Congressman Jose Serrano Introduces Bill to Abolish Presidential Term Limits
Serrano’s latest effort, like previous attempts, has been referred to the House Judiciary Committee where it will most certainly languish and die. The resolution has no cosponsors.
Efforts to repeal the 22nd Amendment are nothing new. A 2005 attempt by Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) had bipartisan co-sponsorship that included Reps. Frank Pallone (D-N.J.) and Jim Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.) but went nowhere, as did a resolution introduced by Sen. Harry Reid (D-Nev.) in 1989.
The late Rep. Guy Vander Jagt, then the chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee, introduced legislation to repeal presidential term limits in 1986 so as to pave the way for Ronald Reagan to seek a third term.
”The 22nd Amendment is an insult to American voters who are wise and well-informed,” Vander Jagt said at the time.
Reagan himself expressed support for the amendment’s repeal, saying it interfered with the right of the people to “vote for someone as often as they want to do.”
Former President Bill Clinton has frequently spoken out in favor of allowing presidents to serve more than two terms, provided they take some time off before running for a third time.
“I’ve always thought that should be the rule,” Clinton said in November. “I think as a practical matter, you couldn’t apply this to anyone who has already served, but going forward, I personally believe that should be the rule.
It’s an odd thing...for around 150 years...Presidents never stayed more than two terms, without any rules in place. Only as we get to the FDR period, does this change. By the mid-1940s...there’s a fairly long view by most voters that some things done in the interest of the Depression...really didn’t do much except extend the depression, and the general fault goes back FDR himself. So rules were enacted to ensure that we didn’t get into that kind of mess again. Personally, I’d like the same limits for Senators and Congressmen. Rather than create full-time, life-time folks for positions...like Lords-for-life, it’s best to keep moving them on at some point.
This same Rep has introduced this Bill in each new Congress going back to 2003. I think it was proposed in prior congresses also. It’s not going to happen, at least not in this Congress, IMO.
Other threads on this Bill if anyone is interested in the comments thereon:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2975467/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2975370/posts
0bambi doesn’t need to worry about any silly Constitutional Amendment. He’ll run again and again OR he’ll simply name himself President-for-life, then his wife, his daughters, their children, etc.
Yes, he is learned from his buddies, Chavez & Castro.
Falling on the floor, laughing hysterically.
As a wise, well-informed voter, I NEVER want to see any one president serve more than 2 terms. EVER.
It's the foolish, ill-informed who support eliminating such limits. Like the ones who voted twice for president obamination.
Thank Heaven for the Constitution!
Meh, will never pass as whoever is NOT in power will make sure of it.
LOL....LOL....LOL....LOL....LOL
LOL....LOL....LOL....LOL....LOL
LOL....LOL....LOL....LOL....LOL
Is that the sound of 90 million guns locking and loading?
Replace it with term limits on the House and Senate?
”The 22nd Amendment is an insult to American voters who are wise and well-informed,”. . .
Falling on the floor, laughing hysterically.
Yeah, these same wise and informed American voters elected a fraud TWICE together with his corrupt cabinet.
Repeal of the 22nd Amendment shall not possibly come in time to be of any benefit to Bronco Bama, short of totally suspending the Constitution altogether (do not count this possibility out).
NOW, Bronco Bama is looking for a loophole allowing him to unilaterally raise the amount of whatever national debt which has been incurred, under the 14th Amendment, Section 4, but it takes a keen eye indeed to detect this authority in the phrase, “The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services is suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned.” The validity might not be questioned, but the authority to increase it certainly can and should be.
Is this in the same Constitution that Bronco Bama wants to simply declare “invalid”? If suspended, ALL the provisions are equally inoperative, and it is like, well, trying to run the nation’s finances without a formal budget for disbursing the resources of the US Treasury.
Oh, wait. The Senate has not acted on a budget measure since about 2009....
It takes more than a congressional resolution or even a law to remove the term limit restriction. It takes a constitutional amendment, and and amendment wouldn’t even get a majority in either the House or Senate much less a 2/3’rds vote.
Plus a Constitutional Amendment has to be ratified by 3/4s of the states.
I think he may have gotten the idea from his cousin Teddy. Although Theodore Roosevelt only served the remaining three and a half years of McKinley's second term and was only elected to one addtional term, he ran for President again as the Bull Moose candidate in 1912. Had he been elected in 1912, he would have served almost three terms.
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