When Mike Gallagher first ran for Congress in 2016, one of his promises was that he would not be making his time as a representative forever. Gallagher touted his support for term limits, believing that serving the people should be a privilege and not a career, a welcome point of view for those who are tired of the same old folks populating the U.S. Capitol and running like a rickety barge.
Gallagher’s not the first one who has promised this, as countless others who tout the need for constant political transfusions in Washington, D.C., claim they’re going to only serve for a few years and then make way for some new people and new ideas. Then, lo and behold, those people are still walking the halls of Congress a few decades later.
The difference between those folks and Gallagher is that the latter kept his promise, a virtue sorely lacking in most levels of government. He recently announced he would not be seeking a fifth term in the 8th Congressional District, and in a statement he pointed out that “the Framers intended citizens to serve in Congress for a season and then return to their private lives. Electoral politics was never supposed to be a career and, trust me, Congress is no place to grow old.”
When you think about it, we have term limits in place for the president of the United States, the top elected position in the land. They only get to serve in the office for two terms or a maximum of 10 years if a vice president or someone else in the succession line becomes president in the middle of someone else’s term. The 22nd Amendment was crafted after Franklin Roosevelt was elected four times as president at a time when people felt having one person in power for too long was detrimental to the country.
We do this for the executive branch, but yet we let the representatives of the legislative branch continue to serve for decades. Many serve until they feel they’re too old to keep up the same pace that they’ve done for 30 or 40 years, or in the case of Dianne Feinstein, she actually died while in office at age 90, being the oldest member of the U.S. Senate at that time.
Gallagher did a good job serving in Congress, but I personally wish he’d pushed more for term limits for all. He proved himself to be a man of integrity by keeping his promise not to make Washington a lifetime commitment, but apparently rules need to be laid down for the other 434 members of the U.S. House of Representatives and 100 members of the U.S. Senate to get in line.
It’s easy to see why folks would want to remain in the federal government indefinitely. The salary for the rank-and-file members is $174,000. To be a leader in the majority or minority party gets your pay bumped up to $193,400, and if you become Speaker of the House, you get paid $223,500. Getting that kind of pay makes it easy to consider staying in office forever.
It also explains why the politicians haven’t come forward with any efforts to limit themselves. A Pew Research Center survey from last summer found 87% of respondents support congressional term limits. Some states have implemented term limits for elected state officials.
Folks might say that the way to limit politicians is for the people to vote them out of office. If the electorate took the time to research the candidates and their records instead of being spoon-fed through campaign commercials, that would be a good argument. However, the numbers show that over 90% of elections are often uncompetitive, and in the 2022 midterms, 100% of U.S. Senate incumbents got reelected.
Gallagher decided to choose integrity above all, which has caused many in the Republican Party to express disappointment because of what he’s accomplished in eight years. The powers-that-be in the GOP want him to keep on trucking. However, he made a promise, and he’s keeping it. Hopefully, he’ll be replaced by someone with just as much integrity, and that person will carry the banner of term limits for all. Gallagher’s time is up, and for others in Congress, it’s past time.
Lee Pulaski is the city editor for NEW Media. Readers can contact him at lpulaski@newmedia-wi.com.
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