Loren Lippincott
Readers may have heard that I recently introduced a bill in the Nebraska Legislature calling for a limited Article V Constitutional Convention for proposing a single amendment to the U.S. Constitution for term limits on Congress. Nine states have already passed this resolution and a total of 34 states are needed in order for such a convention to be called. This is in line with our Nebraska federal delegation which has signed a pledge to back term limits, but only a few of their colleagues will likely follow suit. If members of Congress won’t set limits on themselves, the states must take action to do it for them.
Article V of the U.S. Constitution allows it to be amended by two-thirds of both the Senate and the House or by two-thirds of the state legislatures calling for an amendment. Once 34 states submit resolutions, Congress would then set a time and place for the convention. Each state would have one vote to ratify by state legislature or state convention, and threefourths (38) of the states would need to ratify the amendment. (Per the 1995 Supreme Court ruling, “U.S. Term Limits v. Thornton,” only a constitutional amendment can put term limits on Congress.)
Why is this issue so important to the future of our republic? I’ll give you four reasons.
First, it would improve the accountability of congress to voters. Most states are governed by citizen legislators who serve part time with relatively low pay while going back to their small districts and living and working among their constituents most of the year. Legislators retain their full-time jobs in the private sector and remain connected to the voters. Meanwhile, state legislative races have lower barriers to entry, because a challenger without a massive campaign war chest can emerge to hold an incumbent accountable.
There is much turnover in the state legislatures which keeps them accountable, but in Washington the opposite is the case. Congress is broken with the incumbency advantage shutting out healthy competition for seats. In the 2022 mid-term, 100 percent of incumbent U.S.
Senators who ran kept their seats. In the House the retention percentage was 95.
The best way to bring Congress back to this citizen legislator model is by adopting term limits, which generate open seat races with lower barriers to entry. Members of Congress would maintain the closeness and accountability with constituents that has proven so elusive at the federal level.
Secondly, term limits would encourage innovation. The states were intended to be laboratories of innovation and they have delivered on that promise. Because state legislators are made up of business people and workers with strong connections to their communities, they are often bringing fresh ideas and road-tested strategies to their legislative work. Too often in Washington calcification and distance from the real world prevents the best and most creative ideas from being applied at the federal level. As a result, we have a Congress, which is starved for innovation. Term limits provide a gateway for state lawmakers, who are on the cutting edge of policy, to bring new ideas to Washington, which can help solve major national problems.
Next, term limits would open opportunities for people with solid business experience to serve in Washington. At the federal level, there is no pathway for an individual with private sector success to serve meaningfully in Congress without fully abandoning their private career for 15 to 20 years, so successful business people often choose not to run. (This results in a Congress made up mostly of career politicians.) With term limits, industrious people could run and serve for a short time, then return to live under the laws they have made. This would provide diversity of experience to a body in which that is sorely lacking.
Fourthly, limiting Congressional terms would foster fiscal responsibility and lessen the influence of lobbyists and big money interests. Unlike states, Congress has no balanced budget requirement. Studies have shown there is a strong correlation between the length of time a person has spent in Congress and their penchant for approving spending increases.
Term limits would result in more fiscal responsibility, while giving legislators the freedom to take on wasteful spending and debt.
Loren Lippincott represents Legislative District 34 in the Nebraska State Senate. Read his column in the Nance County Journal.