NEWS: Do term limits work?

Maybe, depending on your goal, experts say

News analysis by Lindsay Street, contributing writer  |  On Tuesday, state Rep. Joshua Putnam, an Anderson Republican first elected in 2011, will find out whether he will be able to introduce a bill in the legislature to limit the terms of all House and Senate members.  

To move forward, all he has to do is best Democratic challenger Anna Brown at the polls — a feat that might not be that much of a heavy lift following three waves of GOP gerrymandering over 22 years that has made the district favorable to Putnam.

Across the country, the notion of limiting elected officials’ length of service, which has been  hibernating in policy circles in recent years, is back in vogue thanks to a national ill will toward career politicians blamed for increasing dysfunction at all levels of government.

Term limit advocates, such as Putnam,  say cutting  terms will create a sense of urgency in a stagnant legislative body and bring more fresh ideas to the legislature. Some also see term limits as a way to end corruption.

Opponents, however, say term limits are placebos disguised as panaceas that do nothing to really address voter concerns of corruption or hyper-partisanship.  In fact, they warn term limits could actually  empower bureaucrats and lobbyists further as they will wipe out institutional knowledge needed to turn the wheels of government.  Furthermore, they point out that term limits actually already exist — they’re called elections.

“People who argue for term limits are arguing a one-dimensional solution to issues that go much deeper,” said Ferrel Guillory, director of the University of North Carolina at- Chapel Hill’s Program on Public Life, which works to education  politicians and journalists about public policy in the South.

Fifteen state legislatures in the United States have term limits.  Many state term limits were imposed in the early 1990s during a flare-up of anti-incumbency fever. Nebraska is the exception,  It passed term limits in 2000.

With so many test cases, there should be a definitive answer to the question of whether  term limits work, but the answer appears to be dependent on why a state government imposed term limits, according to experts.

The promise of term limits is something that is heard everywhere from the campaign trail to kitchen table. The reasons are varied, but consistent themes involve avoiding corruption, getting fresh ideas and increasing efficiency.

Do term limits end corruption?

According to one political reporter, the difference between South Carolina and one state with term limits is palpable.

“The corruption and public embarrassment you see coming out of the South Carolina legislature just doesn’t exist (in Colorado),” said Corey Hutchins, who covered politics in the Palmetto State for nearly a decade.  [Editor’s note:  Hutchins offered several stories for Statehouse Report before he moved to Colorado two years ago.]

“I often wonder how much of that has to do with an entitlement mentality that comes with holding power for decades,” he said.

Colorado lawmakers’ terms are limited to eight years in the House and eight years in the Senate.

But in another term-limited state, Arkansas, a serving representative countered Hutchins’ point.

“From looking at what’s happened in Arkansas politics since ‘92, there certainly hasn’t been any reduced corruption in terms of incidents and frequency of corrupt activity taking place,” Arkansas state Rep. Warwick Sabin told Statehouse Report.

Sabin said he is “indifferent” to term limits. He was elected after term limits were in effect in his state. “There have been plenty of incidents of both criminal corruption, as well as just sort of that appearance of impropriety that has occurred in our political system among those subject to term-limit rules.”

If a goal of term limits is to fight corruption, it is unclear whether they work.

Do term limits force quicker legislative action?

Putnam said he favors term limits in South Carolina because influence goes to senior legislators, while freshman legislators must wait their turns, if they continue to get elected. He said his proposed bill would look at limiting time in office to 12 or 16 years in total.

“A term limit would put everybody on the same playing field,” Putnam said.

Putnam pointed to Florida, with its maximum limits of eight years in the House and eight years in the Senate, as an example of how fresh legislatures can cause a governing body to respond quicker.

But opponents say setting arbitrary limits on a person’s service can make effective legislation difficult and possibly empower bureaucrats and lobbyists due to inexperience in the legislature.

“If your purpose is to get rid of entrenched leaders, it works,” Guillory said.  “If your purpose is to introduce better legislation, it may not work. State legislatures need people with institutional memories, they need experience in building coalitions and working agreements in putting together detailed law.”

This is something Sabin has experienced as a legislator.

“If anything, it has increased the power of the executive branch and the lobbyist community by removing institutional knowledge, and decreased the power of the legislative branch,” he said.

Guillory said term limits work better for an executive branch of government, such as a  governor or the president.

“Given the scope of the power of the executive you can build a rationale for limiting executive terms,” he said.

Junk food of political conversation?

Putnam is a rare breed: a politician who has served in a legislative body and continues to push for term limits.

One of South Carolina’s best-known examples of a politician reneging on his previously-hardened stance on term limits is former Congressman Bob Inglis. Inglis served from 1992 until 1998, fulfilling a promise of keeping himself to three terms. But then he ran again in 2004. At the time, , his brochure announced, “It was a mistake.”

Inglis was re-elected but then ousted by tea party challenger Trey Gowdy in the 2010 election. His reversal on term limits led some to call him a hypocrite. But Inglis told Statehouse Report   that the discussion around term limits is the junk food of political conversation, something without real substance to enact change.

“They just don’t know it yet. They don’t know what I came to know,” Inglis said of term-limit proponents. He said term limits does not address the real challenges of government, and addressing those challenges comes from engaging in “full citizenship.”

“We’d like to blame it on members of Congress, but it’s really us,” Inglis said. “We just need to hold up the mirror and take a good look and say, ‘OK, we’re ready. We’re ready to rise to full citizenship.’”

Voters need to understand how their government operates, he said, adding that knowledge about the legislative process led him to change his mind on term limits.

Guillory said the concept of term limits doesn’t have policy-staying power.

“Term limits is one of those things that sounds really good in casual conversation but they don’t really hold up to any kind of scrutiny when people take the time to think through their impact or actually research their impact as they’ve been implemented anywhere,” Sabin said. “Anyone who follows politics closely, understands political history, who works with or for government, understands that term limits are an artificial and superficial way of addressing the real problems that frustrate everybody.”

Putnam noted that if his proposed term limits are too tough to pass in South Carolina, he has another plan:  He might seek to term-limit state legislative leadership positions, much like is done in the U.S. Congress.

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