Labrador proposes measure to limit reps' terms

Reflecting a top priority of President Donald Trump, Idaho Congressman Raul Labrador hopes to impose term limits on members of Congress.

Labrador introduced a joint resolution Thursday proposing a constitutional amendment that would limit representatives to six two-year terms; senators would be limited to two six-year terms.

The measure isn't retroactive, so any terms served before the amendment is ratified would not count toward the total.

"When I first ran for Congress, conservatives asked if I supported term limits, and I said no," Labrador said in a phone interview. "I had been in a body (the Idaho Legislature) where people served and then left. It was a part-time legislature."

After just a short time in Congress, however, it became apparent that Washington operates under very different rules.

"There's less independence, less ability to get your agenda moving," Labrador said. "It's not the system the framers intended. Everything has to come through the speaker. That's not going to change unless the bodies, the people who are here, change frequently."

Both the House and Senate have seen sharp increases in the average length of service over the past 200 years.

According to a January report from the Congressional Research Service, the average length of service in the House was less than three years for almost the entire 19th century. In 1820, 95 percent of the body had served less than eight years.

Today, the average House member has served 9.4 years, and 20 percent of the body has been in office longer than 16 years. Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., has served for 52 years.

The Senate average is 10.1 years, while 19 percent of the body has served longer than 16 years. In 1820, no one had served that long.

Although term limit proposals have a dismal history in Congress, rarely even getting a vote, Labrador said this was the "perfect time" to take another run at the concept.

"This is what Trump campaigned on," he said. "He wants to clean up Congress and put Americans first. The top priority on his 'Contract with American Voters' is term limits."

In a "60 Minutes" interview in December, Trump said he would "do a lot of things to clean up the system," including push term limits.

House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., said he supports the effort. However, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, wants to leave the issue up to voters.

"We have term limits now," he told reporters after Trump's interview. "They're called elections. It will not be on the agenda in the Senate."

Labrador said leaving it up to voters is the one really strong argument against term limits. However, defeating incumbents today is a much higher hurdle than it was in the past, given the amount of money in politics. Members also are much less likely to leave voluntarily.

The Congressional Research Service notes that since 1930 about 10 percent of House incumbents choose to retire every election cycle. Prior to 1886, by comparison, at least 25 percent retired every session, and the average was closer to 40 percent.

Incumbents also lost more frequently in the past. During the 19th and early 20th centuries, about 15 percent lost on average, compared to about 5 percent since the 1930s.

"With more turnover, there would be a new crop of leaders and different leaders," Labrador said.

Congress last voted on a term limits amendment in 1995, when it failed to secure the two-thirds majority needed to pass the House. As recently as 2012, a non-binding "sense of the Senate" term limits measure was soundly defeated by a 75-25 margin.

The difference this time around, Labrador said, is that a populist president supports the idea.

"We have a weapon we didn't have before, in Trump's Twitter account," he said. "If he decides to push it, it could put a lot of pressure on members."

Labrador's resolution, which has 12 co-sponsors, was referred to the House Judiciary Committee. To succeed, it needs a two-thirds vote in the House and Senate, after which it would have to be ratified by three-quarters of the states.

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Spence may be contacted at bspence@lmtribune.com or (208) 791-9168.