Constitutional Amendment – Term limits of 12 years for serving in Congress
The constitution and bill of rights were created to protect the American people against the danger associated with the excessive accumulation of power in the hands of a few. Our government is meant to be of the people, by the people, for the people…..not of the few, by the few, for the few. We need to keep congress current, effective, and efficient by continuously bringing in new members with new ideas and new approaches. The average length of service by CEOs in US businesses, based on their ability to remain effective, averages to about 10 years. Congress needs the skill set diversity that will be realized through the continuous infusion of new members with their fresh innovations to improve our government. With the current lack of any real innovations in government, government tends to rely heavily on outside contractors for new technology infusion in their routine day-to-day operations just to keep themselves operating at all.
We propose a term limit of 12 years covering combined service in both houses of congress. That is slightly longer than the average US business CEO term to hedge on the side of maintaining institutional knowledge in congress. The exact language would read, “Any member of congress that has served or will have served 12 or more years in congress at the end of their current term can no longer run for a congressional office.” The calendar for years of service would not start for any member of congress until this amendment is ratified. This grandfathers in existing members of congress to allow for a smooth transition to the new term limits. Once the term limits are fully realized with all grandfathered members having left congress, this will also reduce the maximum lifetime pension from just under $140,000 annually to a maximum of just over $35,000 annually based on current congressional salary structure.
The goal is to foster a more efficient and effective congress to increase the likelihood of passing better and smarter legislation rather than focusing on getting re-elected.
“Progress is a nice word. But change is its motivator. And change has its enemies.” -Robert F. Kennedy
We realize that it is unlikely with the number of career politicians in congress to get the necessary two-thirds vote in each house to pass the amendment. So we have been in communication with the movement currently in progress to call for a Convention of States under Article V of the Constitution to get the amendment passed and moved forward for ratification.