Reagan and term limits

Factual Questions
21

[quote=“Stranger_On_A_Train, post:17, topic:51123”]

By 1989 Reagan was 78 years old and clearly struggling mentally (later diagnosed to be suffering from Alzheimer’s Disease). He would not have been effective in a third term, although it is possible that under the guidance of his advisors the United States may have been more consistently supportive of emergent democracy in the fledgling Russian Federation instead of the Bush “wait and see” mode and the Clinton “not our problem” approach under which oligarchy took hold in the former Soviet republics. We may have also seen a greater push to implementing START II and reducing nuclear arsenals.

However, that being said, there is a very persuasive argument for presidential term limits; however good a particular executive may be, the nation overall is generally improved by the presentation of new ideas and new voices. When one idea or leader dominates, it tends toward a political and intellectual stagnation. Even when the transition is between two executives from the same political party, the differences in focus and perspective keep the political landscape vital and allow new ideas to foment.

22

Actually Reagan was not diagnosed until mid 1994, and he was not showing signs until early 1994. He would not have been in office at this point unless he had run for and acquired a third term. Also, people who share your sentiment would BE ABLE TO VOTE HIM OUT! No term limits does not mean they will get reelected for more than two terms or even acquire a second term; look at Ford, Carter, and HW bush. Also, the presidents do not propose new laws; they veto or approve them. Congress drafts new laws/bills

23

Reagan also said he would not run for a third term if 22nd amendment was repealed before the end of his 2nd term.

24

What part is in doubt? Washington certainly could, if he had so chosen, have remained President for his whole life, but voluntarily stepped down after two terms. For most of American history after him, nobody even tried for more than two terms. And when someone did finally try, there was enough public sentiment that we were able to pass a Constitutional amendment prohibiting anyone else from doing it.

25

Yes he set that trend, which was respected by all future presidents save for FDR, Teddy Roosevelt who ran for a third non-consecutive term in 1912 and lost, and Ulysses S Grant who didn’t even get his party’s nomination. Many argue however that Washington choosing not to run for a third term was to keep people to like him, but more widely-accepted is that he was dieing and he did die shortly after; 2 years later so he would have died mid-term. He also likely wanted to retire before his death and had he been elected a third time or even ran it would have stressed him physically and mentally and he might have died sooner; plus he wouldn’t have enjoyed his 2 years of retirement (really he was a general the last 2 years but it was much less stress than president.)

26

The notion that the 22nd Amendment was to restore the “honor system” is the kind of simplistic patriotic lie that used to infest schoolbooks. Like the patriotic lie that Washington chopped down the cherry tree and confessed. It sounds good and perhaps some people tried to sell it that way. No doubt some people even managed to convince themselves that was the motivation.

And it’s ineffable nonsense. The 22nd Amendment was passed for one reason and one reason only: to get back at the Democrats and Roosevelt. There is no other sane reading of American history of that period.

27

The George Washington Principle - “It’s easy to tell the truth when you’re the one holding the axe.”

“Yeah, we elected him president at first, but we didn’t know he was going to hold onto the job like a pope!” - Archie Bunker.

The fact is, for whatever reason, nobody ran for 3 terms and got very far except one man. As mentioned above, the few that tried never got very far. Sounds like a “gentleman’s agreement” situation to me. Right after that, 2-term limit became a constitutional amendment pretty fast. Was the Republican Party really in control of 32 states and congress? Or was this something that everyone could agree on, once the argument was not about one specific guy already in the White House?

What were the ratification votes by state governments - strictly a R/D divide, or pretty even?

PS. What was the discussionlike when FDR did say he was running for a third term? Did a lot of people say it was time to get out? Or was it not mentioned?

28

Since this is GQ, let’s see a cite that it is the unanimous verdict of historians that the only reason for the 22nd was to get back at the Democrats.

Considering Roosevelt was dead when it was passed, I won’t bother asking for a cite that it was to get revenge on the dead.

Regards,
Shodan

29

OK, let’s try to examine this in less than a book’s length.

First, we need to ask what the alternative explanation is. If you’re going to argue it was a purely idealistic re-adoption of the gentleman’s agreement, I’ll bow out now. Nothing in politics, let alone at the level of a Constitutional Amendment, is done for pure unsullied and unmixed idealism.

Can we at least agree that Roosevelt dominated the politics of the country from 1933 to 1945? He was the most popular politician - people treated him as a secular saint and hung his picture next to that of Jesus - and yet virulently opposed.

Roosevelt, it is generally agreed, decided to run for a third term for two reasons. One was that the country was still grappling with the Depression. Conservatives reviled the New Deal but he had also lost the support of a large number of former progressives and liberals - different things at the time - who had switched over for a variety of reasons, ranging from economic theories to dislike of federal controls. They had battled him every moment of the decade and it seemed certain that a successor would have less leverage over them. The second was that Europe was already in WWII. Again, conservatives were loudly isolationist and most liberals were tepidly internationalist at best. Roosevelt wanted to aid Britain and wanted to keep maneuvering to supply the Allies with money and equipment. Both of those would have been jeopardized with Republican control. (What actually occurred in the election was high irony. Republicans, looking for a Republican Roosevelt, nominated Wendell Willkie, probably the most liberal Republican candidate since Teddy Roosevelt (maybe Taft, but still), who ran as a Roosevelt clone. Both were publicly isolationist.)

Roosevelt’s health probably should have kept him from running in 1944, but there was no chance he was going to step down in the middle of the war.

Roosevelt’s run for additional terms lay in the most extraordinary circumstances since the start of the Civil War. You could try to argue that circumstances that dire would happen again in the future, but the abrogation of the gentleman’s agreement lay in a single data point. I would argue at length that no other Amendment ever rested on a single data point and the possibility that it might, just might, happen again in the future.

When was the Amendment proposed? The 22nd Amendment was passed by Congress on March 21, 1947*, which was very early in a session that had seen the Republicans pick up 55 seats in the House and a dozen in the Senate to take control of both bodies for the first time since Hoover. The ratification record by the states is also interesting. 18 states ratified in 1947 and then interest tailed off. Suddenly ratifications start again in 1951. What happened in late 1950? The midterm backlash to the Truman presidency, similar to the backlash in 1946 (and 2010) seeing Republicans back on top all over the country.

Were they still battling the ghost of Roosevelt and the New Deal? I don’t see how you can argue otherwise. Republicans tried hard to reverse the New Deal throughout the 1950s. Still are, in many ways. The cold war, the “loss” of China, the Korean War, McCarthyism, all pulled the country in a more conservative direction. Many of Roosevelt’s advisors were from the multiplicity of far left factions in the 1930s and could easily be tied to Communist groups, statements, or beliefs, and they made convenient scapegoats throughout this period. Truman’s popularity hit lows not to be equaled for decades.

In short (far too late), every aspect of the context of the times was a conservative repudiation of everything associated with Roosevelt, the New Deal, the Democratic Party, and leftist politics in general. The minority party achieved power and used it. The 22nd Amendment was one of hundreds of examples of Republican legislation to change the direction of the country. It happened to be a Constitutional Amendment so it lasts after most legislation is forgotten, but it is nothing more than part of the context of its time.

Could you give me the alternate explanation of the timing and progression of the 22nd Amendment that refutes this?

*Wikipedia is not a good source for history, part 12462.

I bet a cite is needed. The commission first met September 29, 1947, six months after the Amendment had been passed.

30

In all fairness, this is a zombie thread.

31

We interrupt this thread…

From the George Burns and Gracie Allen Show (radio) 1944

And now back to your regularly scheduled thread :slight_smile:

32

Of course, I’m not up on earlier D-R divides or state politics in general, but I see that New York, New Jersey, Illinois, and California are among the states that ratified it early. (Although we don’t see Massachusets). Several southern states, which IIRC(?) were Dem until recently, appear in the last-minute push to get the 2/3 limit. which seems odd if it were strictly a Republican push.

Any comments on the politics of the ratifying states?

33

When?

34

md2000-you need 3/4 of the states.