Hello. I’m Arizona State Senator J.D. Menard, serving in the Arizona State Senate, representing District 13, which is the southeast valley of the Metro. Phenix area, specifically Chandler, Gilbert and the Sun Lakes Retirement Community. And I’m here to tell you about ACR 1016 a resolution. I introduced with bipartisan support and bicameral support. So Republicans and Democrats in both the House and the Senate signed on as co-sponsors.
And what C.R. 1016 would do is essentially have Arizona join other states calling for a convention to pass an amendment to the US Constitution, establishing term limits for Congress. So this is often referred to as an Article five convention Article five refers to the part of the Constitution of the United States that allows for the amendment process to take place.
And one way you can amend the US Constitution is states can actually step forward and say, Hey, we have an idea. We want to make a change and actually bypass Congress. And I think that’s the necessary way to ensure that term limits get passed, because I have very little hope, unfortunately, that Congress will want to limit itself or pass term limits itself.
They could if two thirds of members of Congress refer this to the states that would allow us to then pass it with three fourths of the states agreeing. I just unfortunately don’t think that’s likely to happen. So some states are doing what I’m proposing here in the state of Arizona is that we join with other states to call a convention for proposing an amendment to the US Constitution to establish term limits for Congress.
We know that there are some good folks in Congress, maybe some not so great folks in Congress. But a lot of the time when you get in Congress, you’re kind of stuck there for a long time. And I think it’s good to get fresh blood folks who aren’t just there to be career politicians, but who want to go and serve a noble and worthwhile purpose and then go back to their their community and go on with their lives and serve in other ways.
We’ve seen people take pledges, which I think is a great step, that they’ll only serve so much time. And we’ve seen people break those pledges, unfortunately, because there’s there’s no teeth and it’s only as good as their word. So this would amend the Constitution to ensure that we have term limits on members of Congress. I hope you’ll join me and others as we watch this bill move through the process.
And if you’re watching from another state, encourage your state to join us in this effort as well.