#15 TERM LIMITS vs ADMINISTRATIVE REFORM

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To paraphrase Lord Acton: Incumbency tends to corrupt, and continued incumbency tends to corrupt continuously. However.....

After being a Term Limits fanatic for some time, I have had some second thoughts, as follows:

Term Limits has a dark side, which I have not heard mentioned by anyone, to wit: Given the perverse aspects of human nature, it should be expected that some number of term limited 'lame duck' Congressmen of both houses, and both parties, will, in their final terms, vote for special interest legislation against the best interests of the country, and the will of the voters, in order to assure his/her own future financial well-being after they leave office. Is there any way to counter this very natural tendency? Not very likely, so I submit an equally unlikely alternative:

Perhaps better ways (than term limits) to avoid the abuses of entrenched power, and to improve the quality of Congressional performance would include such ideas as:
a. Prohibiting the use of seniority as a means of awarding any chairmanships.
b. Limit subchairs to two years, and fullchairs to six years
c. Or rotate chairs
d. End the power of chairs to bury bills in committee
e. End the use of seniority in all assignments. ( 'How' is the problem)
f. and so forth. I'm sure there are many other good ideas out there

And last, but not least, these changes should be accomplished expeditiously by Congress itself, in both houses, not by Constitutional amendments, and the changes should be protected from easy tampering in future Congresses by including a requirement for a two thirds vote of both houses for any changes. If, due to parliamentary maneuvering, this protection is not practical, then it may be necessary to resort to a constitutional amendment for congressional administrative reform.

Again, given the less than idealistic tendencies of human nature, especially in the 'old bulls', it would take a drive of truly historic proportions to get changes like these passed, but I'd bet that if we got a lot more freshmen in the next Congress, it would truly be possible, since freshmen would have the most to gain.

Who in Congress (or out of it) could best get this ball rolling? It could be a great campaign plank for aspiring new candidates and/or reelection candidates.

Of course, we have to somehow guard against the law of unintended consequences whenever we fix a problem. And the great weakness of the idea is that Congress could undo it with a simple vote.

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