Term Limits Pros And Cons

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One of the most persuasive arguments for term limits is the very real possibility that a president in office long enough can appoint the entire Supreme Court and much of the federal judiciary in general, thus jeopardizing the independence of the judicial branch and influencing the political direction of the country for much longer than any tenure he could have (Cronin 2015, 87). President Franklin Roosevelt was actually successful in appointing all nine justices of the Supreme Court during his tenure, and although unsuccessful, he had attempted to pack the court with his own justices in his second term. Presidential appointment power has also grown beyond the judiciary to include many executive agencies that have wide-reaching and greatly unchecked …show more content…

In fact, twenty-two of the past forty-four presidents have served only a single term or less, many of whom did so by choice. Both political parties and many presidents and candidates openly advocated for a single-term limit for the presidency throughout the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. The advantage of this single term would be that the presidency would be independent from other institutions. “The temptation of a president to compromise himself and, worse, the nation’s interests to achieve reelection would be eliminated, and a president would be committed to the public interest” (Korzi 2011, 53). A single term would also relieve the president of the burdens associated with reelection (162). Those who advocated for a single-term however, were often quick to abandon the notion when their candidate had the real possibility of a second or even a third term. It is also notable that, even allowing for the political time, the single term presidents of the eighteenth century are often considered the least effective and least memorable. This could be construed as positive or negative depending on the preferred strength of the

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