Indiana’s House of Representatives on Tuesday approved a resolution for the U.S. Congress to hold a convention to amend congressional term limits into the U.S. Constitution.
Author Dave Hall, R-Norman, said he hoped House Joint Resolution 3 would create a “constructive dialogue that ultimately results in a constitutional amendment bringing about opportunity for the American people.”
To trigger a constitutional convention, two-thirds of the states — 34 — must also apply. The resolution specifies that the application could only be aggregated with others dealing with the same topic.
Three-fourths of the states, or 38, must ratify the changes resulting from a convention.
Opposition from both sides
Lawmakers from both parties spoke against the bill on the House floor.
Rep. Aaron Morrison, R-Brazil, described a legislative branch split into four elements: elected officials, their staffers, bureaucrats and lobbyists.
“Silly to cap the amount of time that elected officials can serve but allow institutional knowledge and power to stay with all the others,” Morrison said. “I’m a ‘heck no.'”
Rep. Chris Judy, R-Fort Wayne, noted that the average length of service for the current class of U.S. representatives was 8.5 years (4.3 two-year terms) and for the U.S. Senate, was 11.2 years (1.9 six-year terms.) That’s according to a report by the nonpartisan U.S. Congressional Research Service.
And Rep. Matt Pierce, D-Bloomington, cautioned that it’s unclear if a constitutional convention can be kept to the topic that birthed it.
“There are a lot of legal scholars who say that once you convene, it’s a free-for-all,” Pierce said, quipping that “close personal friends” from California, New York and other Democrat-run states could tweak the Second Amendment and other rights that Indiana’s Republican supermajority often and vocally supports.
“To me, it’s much too great of a risk to have that kind of convention meeting because who knows what the heck the Constitution will look like after it (goes) through that process?” he concluded.
Another member pointed out the term limits would apply to federal office but not the state House and Senate.
Reaction
Lawmakers passed the resolution 59-33, with both bipartisan support and opposition.
U.S. Term Limits, a nonprofit advocating for congressional term limits, celebrated the resolution’s passage.
“The Indiana House got it right today in a big way. People I talk to all over the state are demanding term limits, and the House has heard them loud and clear,” said Micah Beckwith, the organization’s Indiana chair. Beckwith is also a Republican candidate for Indiana lieutenant governor.
The group’s president, Philip Blumel, commended lawmakers, saying that Indiana’s House “… understands that Congress is reluctant to establish term limits on itself. Consequently, the onus is on the states to pick up the mantle to both propose and ratify the term limits amendment.”
The resolution next goes to Indiana’s Senate.
If passed, Indiana would join the six states that have passed identical term limits-focused applications, according to U.S. Term Limits’ “progress” tracker. Sixteen other states have passed different term limit language in multi-subject applications.