Arkansas voters could see competing legislative proposal and citizen initiative on term limits on the 2020 ballot
Last week, the Arkansas legislature passed a constitutional amendment for the 2020 ballot that would change the term limits currently imposed on state legislators. Meanwhile, advocates of tighter term limits are working on a 2020 citizen initiative.
A term limit is a legal restriction that limits the number of terms a person may serve in a particular elected office. There are different types of term limits. Some place an absolute limit on the number of terms a person can serve. Others restrict merely the number of consecutive terms.
Currently, there is a 16-year lifetime term limit for state legislators in Arkansas.
The legislatively referred measure would restrict new state legislators to serving 12 consecutive years with the opportunity to return to the legislature after a four-year break. The 12-year limit would apply to anyone elected in 2021 or after. The 16-year (non-consecutive) limit would apply to legislators first elected prior to 2021. They would be allowed back, however, after a four-year break under the new rules.
The initiative currently targeting the 2020 ballot would re-enact the pre-2014 term limits of two four-year terms (eight years) for state senators and three two-year terms (six years) for state representatives, but it would add an additional limit of 10 years total in the Arkansas General Assembly.
Here’s how the state’s legislative term limits got to where they are now:
- 1992 - 60 percent of voters approved a citizen initiative establishing limits of two four-year terms and three two-year terms for senators and representatives, respectively.
- 2004 - 70 percent of voters rejected a legislatively referred amendment proposing limits of three four-year terms and six two-year terms for senators and representatives, respectively.
- 2014 - 52 percent of voters approved a legislatively referred amendment establishing 16-year lifetime term limits on legislators, among other provisions related to government transparency and
ethics.
- 2018 - A citizen initiative proposing two-term and three-term limits (with a 10-year combined lifetime limit) was certified for the 2018 ballot, but was later removed by the Arkansas Supreme Court based on signature validity and petition circulators.
- 2019 - A citizen initiative identical to 2018’s was filed targeting the 2020 ballot.
- 2019 - The legislature voted to put an amendment on the 2020 ballot proposing limits of 12 consecutive years and no lifetime limit.
The 1992 citizen initiative also placed term limits on the state’s elected members of Congress, although the U.S. Supreme Court later invalidated those limits, ruling that states cannot impose qualifications for prospective members of Congress stricter than those specified in the U.S. Constitution.
As of 2018, fifteen states had term limits for state legislators. The map below shows those states which have enacted such limits:
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