4 Oct 2018 What Constitution Changes Would You Make?

What Constitution Changes Would You Make?

Whenever there is discussion about making changes to the constitution, you have to be very careful about unintended consequences. The changes you want may get adopted, but there may also be other changes adopted that you did not want.

I am going to view this as my “King for the day.”  That is, I am only going to recommend a couple of focused changes and not a whole sale list.

I want to change term limits on Representatives and Senators. If the President can have term limits, then they can too. For the House of Representatives, I would increase a term from two years to four years. This may help reduce some of the constant fundraising they have to do.  I would limit a Representative to three 4-year terms. If someone replaces a current Representative who had to leave office, the new representative will fill out that term and it will count as a full term no matter how short that time may be. That is if there are six months left in the term, the new representative will only get a maximum of eight years and 6 six months to serve if re-elected.

For Senators I would allow two 6-year terms. With the same provision that their first term maybe a short one if they replace the current Senator.  A big change I would make would be to have senators appointed buy governors instead of direct election. Members of the House of Representatives are the closest to the people due to the size of their districts. They are to represent the citizens interest. A Senator represents the states interest. As such, they should be in alignment with the Governor. Senators should work for the governor and be replaced as the Governor so desires. This would make voters take even more interest in the election of Governors.

There are other changes I would want to make (e.g. term limits for judges), but these I feel would have the biggest impact.