The Incumbency Amendment

Part of the problem with Washington is Washington. It's too easy for incumbents to win. They get all the money, they get all the free press, they get all the sway.

Yet term limits is a non-starter, and I agree with it. An electorate does have the power to limit someone's term in office. I fully accept the truth of that.

So maybe term limits aren't the way to go. How about a reset option?

This is what I'm calling the Incumbency Amendment to the Constitution.



This is not an attack on a party or a ruling party. This is an assault precisely on incumbency.

All of the House is re-elected every two years. That's why the bar is this high. I'm open to it being higher - perhaps 85% or 90% is better. That's something to go to the history books and see what works best.

The Senate has only a third of its membership up for election at one time. That's why I have the lower bar there. It works out right now to 25 out of 33 elections per general election (25 is one-quarter of the sitting Senate, not the Senators up for re-election. However, the Senate has staggered terms as well. Senators wouldn't give up their seat until the end of their term, and thus the institutional and enduring character of the Senate will still be a force.

This also protects a newly elected Senator or Representative who is elected in a disqualifying election like this. They would not be sitting during the election, so they would not be forced to give up the seat at the expiration of their term.

It also allows a former Representative to be elected or appointed to the Senate, and vice versa.

So what do you think? Could it work? How do we get the bastards to pass it?

Update: http://www.opensecrets.org/bigpicture/reelect.php

That page shows the problem. Based on that, I'd raise these limits to 90% elected in the House and 30% elected in the Senate. That would still be causing resets.

when running for re-election, let me take issue with the "throw the bums out" term limits ideas.

What we have found with other politicians who are term limited, is that some of them, possibly many of them, are popular and quite good at their jobs. Hell, as a Congressperson, it takes 1 term of 2 years just to learn what is expected of you, and with seniority rules the way they are, 5 terms or more to get to a position of real authority. This is less of a problem in the Senate, but it's still an issue.

Let's just work on getting the corporate and special interest money out of politics. I think that would be the better solution to the problem.

After all, do you really want Dennis Kucinich out of the House, just when he is starting to acquire some power, or Henry Waxman, or (I could go on and on, but you get the picture).

I think term limits are one of the best ways to get special interest money and influence out of politics.

The more time a person is in office, the more time they are susceptible to being influenced by outside money. In addition, it allows lobbyists to build up longstanding personal relationships with members of congress, which is also a big factor.

As far as your argument about Kucinich or Waxman, they have gained power due to their tenure, true, but if everyone were term limited, this wouldn't be much of an issue -- in fact, people would be honored more for their ability than their seniority.

In my ideal world, Representatives would be limited to five 2-year terms, and Senators to two 6-year terms. True, it might cause early retirements of the Ted Kennedys, Charlie Rangels and Robert Byrds of this world, but it would also limit the influences of the Strom Thurmonds, Jesse Helmses and Orrin Hatches.

And I have no doubt it would give real working people a better representative voice.

Here in California state and local elected offices are term-limited, and what we're ending up with is musical chairs: e.g., Jerry Brown can't do more than 2 terms as mayor of Oakland so he moves into the Attorney General position. On the plus side, it means we only have another year or so of Arnold.

I just don't like the idea of "career politicians" generally -- I know we've had some good ones, e.g., Teddy, but we've also had our fair share of bad ones (Helms, Thurmond, Wallace, LBJ, etc.)

Regardless of party, campaign finance, etc., people who are elected over and over and over again are going to lose touch with the people who elected them, whether they realize it or not. We need people in office that have held down a job, run a small business, been denied health insurance, etc., not people whose only experience in life is legislating.

Many are good and popular. It doesn't mean that there aren't other good people who would be popular in those jobs. And under a reset in the House, there would be no more seniority for them. House positions would be awarded based more on merit and expertise. It is to an extent already, but the powerful positions are strictly seniority.

Are you suggesting that if fewer than 87 incumbents are not reelected, the incumbents are elected are not seated for that term or that they can't run in the next election? Either way, seems like a pretty ridiculous and unrealistic idea.

Let's say 85% of incumbents win in the House under this amendment. The newly elected 15% are exempt from having to step down. They're instantly in the seniority for the second Congress they sit in. Everyone else (people sitting when the election takes place) has two more years and then they're done.

The Senate is more complicated when this is tripped. Newly elected people have a six-year term and can be re-elected. Incumbents cycle out at the end of their current term. Seniority is more of a factor in the Senate.

In 2006, the Democrats regained the House but only around 50 incumbents failed to win re-election. Under your proposal, a newly elected repub filling an open seat, like dingbat Bachman, would be able to run in 2008 while someone like Waxman or Kucinich or Conyers could not. That makes no sense to me. Nor does it make any sense to me to penalize the Democrats by forcing out their experienced legislators simply because they weren't able to defeat more repubs (or because the repubs weren't able to defeat more Democrats).

This would keep it from causing so much havoc in the House.

should be an option in every election. You need 51% of the votes cast to win. 49% doesn't cut it.