Can a one-term president come back later?

Factual Questions
1

It just occured to me that I don’t now the answer to this. (What? I’m in Canada. We have a different system.)

I just remembered seeing Dana Carvey doing Bush Sr. saying “Please re-elect me. Wouldn’t want to be a one-termer. Looks bad in the history books…” or something to that effect, and I got to thinking:

Can a president who has been voted out after one term come back after another term has past? I realize it might be unlikely if it was bad popularity that got you turfed to begin with. But legally, could Bush Sr., for example, have been the one to run against Gore?

And if they can, can they serve a term and get re-elected for a full 8 years?

Yeah, I know it’s kind of a dumb question. It just never occured to me before that I don’t know how that works.

2

Sure. Grover Cleveland did it.

3

To answer the second part of the OP: No, the president in question can’t serve more than four years if he or she happens to be re-elected after having been out of office. The 22nd Amendment states that “no person shall be elected to the office of President more than twice.”

Also, it’s worth noting that this amendment was only ratified in 1951, so it didn’t apply to Grover Cleveland when he was in office.

4

They can only serve another 4 yr term as president however

5

Oops MikeS beat me to it (and did it much better)

6

Grover Cleveland was both the 22d & the 24th president. He lost the 1888 election to Chester A. Arthur but won it back in 1892. The last President to run for president after losing an election was Theodore Roosevelt, president from 1901-1909. He ran for President in 1912 but lost. Since the passage of the 22nd Amendment a president would still be limited to a second four year term.

7

Ah. That’s it. I thought someone had been re-elected, but then wondered if I was mixing up my U.S. and Canadian history again (I do that sometimes).

So Grover could have been singing the ABC song in office for 8 years in a row (for a total of 12 years as president) if he hadn’t been turfed?

8

What’s the purpose of this rule? You’d think if someone was really good, you’d want to keep them as long as possible.

9

Nitpick: It was Benjamin Harrison who won the election of 1988, not Chester Arthur. Arthur was Garfield’s vice-president who succeeded to the presidency when Garfield was assassinated.

Ed

10

Theodore Roosevelt lost only in 1912. He chose not to run for reelection in 1908 and pretty much deeded the office to his then friend William Howard Taft. After becoming disenchanted with Taft’s policies and because he was still fairly young, he decided to give it another go as a third party (Progressive) candidate.

11

Of course, I meant the election of 1888!

Ed

12

He lost to Benjamin Harrison. Chester A. Arthur was James Garfield’s VP, and never ran for a term of his own. Cleveland defeated an incumbent Harrison in 1892.

Nixon ran, and won, in 1968, after being defeated by JFK in 1960. I’m not sure what you mean about Teddy Roosevelt. He didn’t run in 1908, so he hadn’t lost a presidential race when he ran in 1912.

13

Theoretically, a large enough voting bloc could be formed and keep the same candidate in office indefinitely. Think unions and FDR.

14

Yes, that’s one argument against it. The reason it was passed though, is that FDR had just recently finished (or nearly finished) four terms in office and people began to question if this is a good idea. Americans have historically had a mistrust of professional politicians (ironic today, no?) and the thought was that the President would go back to his normal life after serving. Long-held power has a way of corrupting and blinding even the noblest ambitions. Washington established the tradition of two terms, and many people felt if two is good enough for George, it’s good enough for anyone.

15

22nd Amendment. The most a President can hypothetically serve is a day less than ten years – lifetime; no issues regarding intervening presidencies make a difference. (Subject to an interesting semantic argument, addressed below.)

A President can be elected to office and serve out his term, and be re-elected. After the second term expires, he is not eligible to serve another term.

If a Vice-President succeeds as President, he may serve out the term to which he was elected Vice-President, and then run for office and be elected in his own right. If he served as President for less than two years prior to running for election as President in his own right, he is entitled to run yet again (E.g., LBJ succeeded in 1963, ran in 1964, was eligible to run in 1968). But if he served as President for two years or more of the term to which he was elected VP, he can only run once in his own right. (E.g., Gerald Ford succeeded in 1974, and could have been elected when he ran in 1976, but if he had been, he would have debarred from running in 1980 – but see below.)

Since Pres. Reagan’s death, there is only one living man precluded from running for President by the 22nd Amendment – W.J. Clinton. Messrs. Ford, Carter, and Bush pere are all eligible to serve another term.

Oddball semantic argument: The wording of the 22nd Amendment addresses being elected as President – and by extension based on the 12th Amendment, being elected Vice-President, since no man can be chosen VP who cannot become President. However, the 25th Amendment generates a new way of becoming President – through nomination and confirmation as Vice-President to fill a vacancy, and then succeeding to the Presidency. This is precisely what happened to President Ford – he was named to replace Spiro Agnew as VP, and then succeeded when Pres. Nixon resigned.

Since the 22nd Amendment bars the election of a President who has served two full terms, or one term and over half of another, it can be construed not to prevent such a person being nominated and confirmed by a non-elective process to fill a vacancy, and then succeeding to the Presidency. And we have had in the past several ex-Presidents who were regarded as elder statesmen, who might be perfect candidates to fill the VP vacancy in time of crisis. (I trust it’s clear that Mr. Clinton is not one of them at present.) But, to give an example, if Teddy Roosevelt had survived into the 1920s and the 25th Amendment had been in place then, would anyone have felt it out of place for him to have been named Coolidge’s VP when Harding died?

16

Don’t worry about mixing up U.S. and Canadian history. Most of us 'Murkins don’t know enough Canadian history to mix the two up. Hell, most of us don’t know enough American history to mix the two up.

Yep, since he was president well before the 22nd ammendment was passed. FDR would’ve done at least 16 years, if that pesky death thing hadn’t gotten in his way.

17

Okay… so can a fomer president come back as VP? Like, could Clinton have been Kerry’s running mate.

(I’m assuming not, since he’d take the Prez. spot if anything happened and that would contravene those fancy amendments, but I’m curious.)

18

Nixon was Vice-President in 1960 not President. I should have said Roosevelt left office sorry/

19

Nope. If he can’t be President, he can’t be Veep, either, as per the last line in the 12th Amendment: “But no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be eligible to that of Vice-President of the United States.”

Interestingly, there’s talk now of amendments revising elegibility, specifically eliminating the Article II, Section 1 requirement limiting the Presidency to natural-born Citizens. This could set the stage for a Schwartzenegger presidential bid, and if the 22nd was repealed at the same time, Arnold vs. Bill in 2008 or 2012 would be damned interesting, even to a Canadian like myself.

20

He ran for president against JFK following two terms as Eisenhower’s VP and lost.