In his writings he expressed that he wanted to remind America that the people were the country’s true leaders. He stressed that he did not want the Presidency to be a lifetime position. He wanted no part of a kingship or monarchy. The two-term limitation continued as a tradition until FRD was elected to four terms. Many felt that FDR’s administration ended up with a sense of entitlement and owners
hip of the Presidency. This resulted in the passage of the 22nd Amendment, in which Congress placed term limits on the Presidency. No person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice, and no person who has held the office of President, or acted as President, for more than two years of a term to which some other person was elected President shall be elected to the office of the President more than once. But this article shall not apply to any person holding the office of President when this article was proposed by the Congress, and shall not prevent any person who may be holding the office of President, or acting as President, during the term within which this article becomes operative from holding the office of President or acting as President during the remainder of such term. This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by the legislatures of three-fourths of the several States within seven years from the date of its submission to the States by the Congress. Our Founding Fathers were wise enough to break up the powers of our government into three parts (separation of powers); Executive (President), legislative (congress) and judicial (Federal court). Presidents are limited to two terms. Judges are either appointed for life (in the case of the Supreme Court) or elected but then never have to face re-election (they only have “maintenance” elections). Members of Congress face elections but have no limits. Our Founding Fathers actually debated Congressional term limits, but they did not see it as being necessary. They simply could not envision career politicians. Additionally, at that time the pay was low and the power of government was limited. Being a member of congress was not looked upon as a position of power, but rather a civic duty. One ran and, if elected, served his duty. Upon completion of his term he returned home to his regular job (do we really want elected officials whose only means of making a living is elected office?). Today the government has gained extreme powers, elected officials have extreme amounts of influence, and career politicians seem to be the norm. Once elected, absent any extreme scandal, it becomes very difficult to oust an incumbent from power. Incumbency provides a significant advantage to a candidate. Special interests and large-dollar donors flow to those who are currently in power and have control over government purse strings. Incumbents also carry the distinct advantage of staying in the public eye simply in the course of their duties and at the public expense, making campaigning considerably easier. Look around and you’ll notice the names of our elected officials on all kinds of letterheads and such. This is all campaign material paid for by the taxpayers. They are there for the long run and big business and special interest groups know this. This allows these special interest big money groups to fun “their” candidate to the extreme. Once their guy is in power, they likely have him in office for life. Power breads corruption. Even if we elect the most honest person out there, they are thrown into a mass of corruption. The longer they are in with all this corruption, and given all this power for years and years, they are bound to be overtaken by it all. Elections are bought and paid for, the amounts spent on campaigns today are completely staggering and hard to fathom. Creating term limits will remove the incentive for mega-corporations and special interest groups to buy campaigns, to spend the money to keep elected officials in their back pockets, and help end corruption. We need term limits! This is not an option. Spending is out of control in our government. Taxes go up, spending goes up even more. Even in areas of government spending we all agree we need, there are gross amounts of waste (anyone recall the reports of $500 toilet seats and $300 hammers?). Yet no one is accountable, due to the severe power of incumbency. We, The People, must remove this power and go back to a more limited government. We The People of Illinois must push for term limits to be on our ballot. We must insist on term limits to all members of Congress elected from Illinois. We must also insist on term limits for state level elected officials! Sadly, none of our current elected officials are willing to limit their own power, which shows just how corrupt they are. The only way for We The People to make this happen is to get the word out, gain support of the masses, and get this issue on the ballot. Let The People vote on this issue.
