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The Twenty-second Amendment to the United States Constitution was an addition to the United States Constitution that put a limit on how many times a person could be elected to be President. A person is limited to eight (and possibly ten) years as president. Congress passed the amendment on March 21, 1947. It was ratified on February 27, 1951.
The President of the United States is elected to have that position for a "term" that lasts for four years. The Constitution had no limit on how many times person could be elected as president. The nation’s first president, George Washington chose not to try to be elected for a third term. This suggests that two terms were enough for any president. Washington’s two-term limit became the unwritten rule for all Presidents until 1940.
In 1940, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt won a third term. He won a fourth in 1944. Roosevelt had brought the nation through the Great Depression of the 1930s and almost all of World War II. He was a very popular president. Roosevelt died in April 1945. This was just months after the start of his fourth term. Soon after his death, Republicans in Congress began the work of creating Amendment XXII. Roosevelt was the first and only President to serve more than two terms.
The amendment was passed by Congress in 1947. It was ratified by the states on February 27, 1951. The Twenty-Second Amendment says a person can only be elected to be president two times for a total of eight years. It does make it possible for a person to serve up to ten years as president. This can happen if a person (most likely the Vice-President) takes over for a president who can no longer be president. If this person serves two years or less of the last President’s term, he or she may serve for two full four-year terms. If he or she served more than two years of the last President's term, the new President can serve only one full four-year term.
Since 1985, there have been many tries to either change or remove this amendment. This began when Ronald Reagan was serving his 2nd term as President. Since then, changes have been tried from both Democrats and Republicans. No changes have been made.
There is some debate about how this amendment works with the 12th Amendment. The 12th Amendment limits who can become Vice-President to only people who meet the requirements of being President. One side of the debate points out that since a 2 term president can not become president again, that person can also not be vice-president. The other side of the debate is that the 12th Amendment deals with requirements but the 22nd deals with elections. This side points out that not being allowed to be elected does not mean that person does not meet the requirements needed by the 12th Amendment. Since no president who has served two terms has ever tried to be vice-president, this problem has not yet been decided by the courts.
Harry S. Truman became President because of the death of Roosevelt. He served most of Roosevelt's last term as President. This would have limited him to being elected only one time, but he was not affected since the amendment did not affect the person who was the current President when the amendment was originally proposed by Congress. Since this provision could only have applied to Truman, it was an obvious effort not to limit him. Truman did win the election in 1948 but ended his try to be President in 1952 before the election began.
Lyndon B. Johnson is the only president so far who could have served more than 8 years under this amendment. He became President in 1963 after John F. Kennedy was assassinated. He served the last 14 months of Kennedy's term. Because this was less than two years, he was allowed to be elected for two terms. He won the first term in 1964 but ended his try for a second term before the elections in 1968.
Gerald Ford Became President in 1974 after Richard M. Nixon left office. Ford served the last 29 months of Nixon's term. This meant he could only be elected as president once but he lost that election to Jimmy Carter in 1976.
Dwight D. Eisenhower, Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama could not be elected again because of this amendment. All of them were elected twice. Carter, and George H. W. Bush can run for president again as they have only been elected once.
Section 1. No person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice, and no person who has held the office of President, or acted as President, for more than two years of a term to which some other person was elected President shall be elected to the office of President more than once. But this Article shall not apply to any person holding the office of President when this Article was proposed by Congress, and shall not prevent any person who may be holding the office of President, or acting as President, during the term within which this Article becomes operative from holding the office of President or acting as President during the remainder of such term.
Section 2. This Article shall be inoperative unless it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by the legislatures of three-fourths of the several States within seven years from the date of its submission to the States by the Congress.
Ulysses S. Grant narrowly lost his party's nomination, and chance for a third term in 1880.
Woodrow Wilson, pictured in 1923, deadlocked the Democratic convention in 1920, but was not nominated. He wished to run again in 1924, but lacked support and died before the convention.
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Franklin D. Roosevelt, pictured in August 1944, was elected to both a third and fourth term, the only president to serve more than eight years.
Amendment XXII in the National Archives
