Congressional Term Limits

[Gawdzilla Sama]

The long the Congresscritter stays in office the more power they get. It's an advantage to a state to have very senior Congressmen, they get seats on the House Ways and Means committee. https://waysandmeans.house.gov/

Yeah, that makes sense to me, I’m not sure it’s really a good or a bad thing though.  Having experience, on the whole is probably a good thing, and it makes sense that more experienced congressional members would have more influence.

PoliSci 101 at Purdue. The prof. talked about the yin and the yang of it. The yang is that a lame duck Congressman may not vote in a way that favors his/her state. They won't be reelected so they've nothing to lose by voting as they please.

[Aristocatt]

Yeah, that makes sense to me, I’m not sure it’s really a good or a bad thing though.  Having experience, on the whole is probably a good thing, and it makes sense that more experienced congressional members would have more influence.

PoliSci 101 at Purdue. The prof. talked about the yin and the yang of it. The yang is that a lame duck Congressman may not vote in a way that favors his/her state. They won't be reelected so they've nothing to lose by voting as they please.

Yeah, there are studies that show the issue is exacerbated by term limits. They lead to elected officials more frequently being at the end of their terms, and so more frequently not acting at the behest of voters. The study I posted before alludes to how that problem plays out in Brazil.

[arewethereyet]

I have thought there should be term limits after watching assistants pull the strings on Strom Thurmond when he was nearing the end of his half century in the senate. It was a Weekend at Bernie's political joke. Prior to his health really failing the man was in every small town parade and at every little festival he could manage. Then the state of SC went on a renaming binge making sure buildings, lakes, parks, and streets "honored" that old lecher.

[Aristocatt]

I have thought there should be term limits after watching assistants pull the strings on Strom Thurmond when he was nearing the end of his half century in the senate. It was a Weekend at Bernie's political joke. Prior to his health really failing the man was in every small town parade and at every little festival he could manage. Then the state of SC went on a renaming binge making sure buildings, lakes, parks, and streets "honored" that old lecher.

Not familiar with the example, maybe I misunderstood, but this seems to be an advocacy for age limits rather than an advocacy for term limits?

[arewethereyet]

I have thought there should be term limits after watching assistants pull the strings on Strom Thurmond when he was nearing the end of his half century in the senate.  It was a Weekend at Bernie's political joke.  Prior to his health really failing the man was in every small town parade and at every little festival he could manage.  Then the state of SC went on a renaming binge making sure buildings, lakes, parks, and streets "honored" that old lecher.

Not familiar with the example, maybe I misunderstood, but this seems to be an advocacy for age limits rather than an advocacy for term limits?

48 years is a long damn time for the same old miserable man to hold the office.  

Look him up - among other things stacked with his skeletons was the bi-racial daughter he denied.  

Were he still alive he would be right in line with the pu&&y grabbing, racist Trump cult.  

The only time I had an ounce of concern was when his lovely young daughter was killed when walking in the college area of Columbia after being hit by a drunk driver. 

He was an awful human being all around but the people of SC kept voting him in...something you probably won't find is information regarding the parades he participated in that also included Klan members in full robes.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

He was a big frog in a small pond type of guy. I suspect he had dirt on everyone who was ever in Congress.

[Aristocatt]

Not familiar with the example, maybe I misunderstood, but this seems to be an advocacy for age limits rather than an advocacy for term limits?

48 years is a long damn time for the same old miserable man to hold the office.  

Look him up - among other things stacked with his skeletons was the bi-racial daughter he denied.  

Were he still alive he would be right in line with the pu&&y grabbing, racist Trump cult.  

The only time I had an ounce of concern was when his lovely young daughter was killed when walking in the college area of Columbia after being hit by a drunk driver. 

He was an awful human being all around but the people of SC kept voting him in...something you probably won't find is information regarding the parades he participated in that also included Klan members in full robes.

So he sounds like a shit person.  I'm on board with you there.

My question about age limits, is that, it seems like the issue as initially framed was that he was able to stay in office well past the point where he was mentally/physically competent enough to do the job(regardless of how shit a candidate he was).  That to me seems like an issue with age rather than term.

Put another way...If he had never been in Congress before, a term limit would not prevent the assistants from "pulling the strings" on an old man elected to office.

Also, if our concerns are with our elected officials having their strings pulled by congressional staffers, lobbyists, special interest groups, etc, etc...
The evidence for this isn't really great for term limit advocacy(Although, it is worth repeating every time I post any evidence here...that the evidence that I can find is pretty sparse across the board, I don't think any of this makes it clear cut, but it's a starting point for us to be skeptical about our intuitions on the issue.)...
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10....0100100404

[arewethereyet]

48 years is a long damn time for the same old miserable man to hold the office.  

Look him up - among other things stacked with his skeletons was the bi-racial daughter he denied.  

Were he still alive he would be right in line with the pu&&y grabbing, racist Trump cult.  

The only time I had an ounce of concern was when his lovely young daughter was killed when walking in the college area of Columbia after being hit by a drunk driver. 

He was an awful human being all around but the people of SC kept voting him in...something you probably won't find is information regarding the parades he participated in that also included Klan members in full robes.

So he sounds like a shit person.  I'm on board with you there.

My question about age limits, is that, it seems like the issue as initially framed was that he was able to stay in office well past the point where he was mentally/physically competent enough to do the job(regardless of how shit a candidate he was).  That to me seems like an issue with age rather than term.

Put another way...If he had never been in Congress before, a term limit would not prevent the assistants from "pulling the strings" on an old man elected to office.

Also, if our concerns are with our elected officials having their strings pulled by congressional staffers, lobbyists, special interest groups, etc, etc...
The evidence for this isn't really great for term limit advocacy(Although, it is worth repeating every time I post any evidence here...that the evidence that I can find is pretty sparse across the board, I don't think any of this makes it clear cut, but it's a starting point for us to be skeptical about our intuitions on the issue.)...
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10....0100100404

I hesitate to put an upper age limit on anyone.  You can have a person in their 50s with early onset dementia who clearly shouldn't be holding an important government position and you can have someone like RBG who was sharp as a tack right up to the end of her life at 84.  

When you start putting an upper age limit on people you are losing out on people with knowledge and experience that can't be found everywhere.

There's a reason the president can only serve a certain number of terms in office.  I don't see why that type of term limit isn't reasonable in other government positions.

**Speaking of RBG - I am not a fan of the lifelong appointments for SCOTUS.  I'm just saying I think she was still quite capable, regardless of age, to do the job.

[Aristocatt]

I hesitate to put an upper age limit on anyone.  You can have a person in their 50s with early onset dementia who clearly shouldn't be holding an important government position and you can have someone like RBG who was sharp as a tack right up to the end of her life at 84.  

When you start putting an upper age limit on people you are losing out on people with knowledge and experience that can't be found everywhere.

There's a reason the president can only serve a certain number of terms in office.  I don't see why that type of term limit isn't reasonable in other government positions.

**Speaking of RBG - I am not a fan of the lifelong appointments for SCOTUS.  I'm just saying I think she was still quite capable, regardless of age, to do the job.

Yeah, that makes sense to me.  
Just to clarify, and I'm sorry for being hyper fixated here...
The issue then isn't really with age or term, we could take your example and just replace age with term and it's still true.
The real issue you are bringing up is with cognitive decline.  And that, to me makes sense.
Would you agree that there are probably better ways to address cognitive decline in Congress than with term or age limits?
Would you agree that age will correlate much more strongly with cognitive decline than terms served?

RBG I think is a good counter point to age limits.

I'm not as familiar with the arguments for term limiting SCOTUS at this point.  I've been super fixated on the arguments for Congress.
I am sure there is both a lot of overlap, and quite a few differences to keep in mind when considering term limits for different branches and levels of government.

[arewethereyet]

I hesitate to put an upper age limit on anyone.  You can have a person in their 50s with early onset dementia who clearly shouldn't be holding an important government position and you can have someone like RBG who was sharp as a tack right up to the end of her life at 84.  

When you start putting an upper age limit on people you are losing out on people with knowledge and experience that can't be found everywhere.

There's a reason the president can only serve a certain number of terms in office.  I don't see why that type of term limit isn't reasonable in other government positions.

**Speaking of RBG - I am not a fan of the lifelong appointments for SCOTUS.  I'm just saying I think she was still quite capable, regardless of age, to do the job.

Yeah, that makes sense to me.  
Just to clarify, and I'm sorry for being hyper fixated here...
The issue then isn't really with age or term, we could take your example and just replace age with term and it's still true.
The real issue you are bringing up is with cognitive decline.  And that, to me makes sense.
Would you agree that there are probably better ways to address cognitive decline in Congress than with term or age limits?
Would you agree that age will correlate much more strongly with cognitive decline than terms served?

RBG I think is a good counter point to age limits.

I'm not as familiar with the arguments for term limiting SCOTUS at this point.  I've been super fixated on the arguments for Congress.
I am sure there is both a lot of overlap, and quite a few differences to keep in mind when considering term limits for different branches and levels of government.

I don't think there is a way to prevent someone in office from going through cognitive decline.  We really can't govern that.  Any number of things could cause actual or perceived decline.  And many of the causes can't be predicted...it's not all about age.

Term limits make sense to me.  The good ole boy network needs to be broken up a bit.  Some of the long timers are there because of the "we've always done it this way" mentality.  

As for congress...I think a couple of consecutive terms would be enough but I am not opposed to them running again after a period of time.

SCOTUS lifelong terms are part of the "we've always done it this way" mentality.  I think a decade would be a good end time.  That could lend itself to consistency without stagnancy.