Eighty years ago today, Franklin Delano Roosevelt was inaugurated as the 32nd president of the United States. Two-hundred sixteen years ago today, John Adams was inaugurated as the second president of the United States. These two former U.S. presidents are important to this column’s theme.
In the 1700s, the U.S. was still in a fragile state. The world watched to see if its government system would hold up. The first president, George Washington, was so incredibly popular that he could have run for as many terms as he wanted and quite possibly would have won them all. But he did not. What George Washington did was historic and set the precedent for upcoming president. Washington stepped down after two terms in office and allowed new candidates step up to run the nation.
This was not law, however. Washington merely set a tradition that every other president followed … until FDR in 1933. On March 4, 1933, FDR took office as the president of the United States for the first of four terms. With the war on both fronts in mid-swing at the end of FDR’s second term, voters did not want to switch FDR out just yet. He ran for a third term and was victorious, as he was with a fourth.
Because of this, the 22nd Amendment to the Constitution was passed, limiting presidents to two terms only.
Good idea? Maybe, maybe not. If a president is popular enough to get elected three, four, five, ten times, then so be it. If the president isn’t doing well, he/she wouldn’t be voted in again.
But if they are doing very well and can continue to do so, why should they have to give up their seat because of policy and not because of losing an election?
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