Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee told Newsmax on Monday that enacting term limits on members of Congress could help restore public confidence in the system.
"There is a two-word solution to how we could fix a lot of [dissatisfaction with Congress], term limits," Huckabee said during "Carl Higbie Frontline" Monday. "Nobody should go to the House or Senate and stay for a career."
Huckabee said that members of the House and Senate should be limited to serving 12 years or less in total, which would be six two-year terms for the House, and two six-year terms for Senators.
He said that he also believes in repealing the 17th amendment that allows for the direct election of Senators instead of them being appointed by their respective state legislatures.
"I think we ought to repeal the 17th amendment. It was a huge mistake," he said. "It was done just a little over 100 years ago. Most Americans don't even know about it. The fact that Senators were originally appointed by their state legislatures, and they were not elected by the popular vote of the people, and there was a good reason the founders had it that way.
The amendment, passed by Congress in 1912 and ratified a year later, due to problems experienced in the late 19th century with some state legislatures deadlocking on votes to appoint members, leaving the seats open for years in some cases, according to the National Archives.
Huckabee said that under term limits, it may not be as much of a problem if each Senator could only serve two terms before being replaced by law.
"But if we had term limits, even if we paid them [the current salary of] $174,000 per year, they wouldn't be there forever finding out other ways to end up becoming millionaires on $174,000 a year salary," he said. "So, let's hope that happens, and I, for one, would love to see an absolute limit on how many years a person can serve."
He said that term limits are used in many states for governors and is the law of the land for presidents following the administration of former president Franklin Roosevelt.
"We do it on the executive branch," he said. "Somebody explain [to me] how come we don't do it in the legislative branch, or the judicial branch for that matter."
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