The 22nd Amendment at age 75: is it seriously under challenge?

Feb. 27 marks the 75th anniversary of the 22nd Amendment to the Constitution, when Minnesota’s ratification gave the three-quarters of the 48 states required by Article V. Now it is back in the public consciousness as President Trump’s supporters take aim at its limitations.

The intention is straightforward: “No person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice.” Furthermore, “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 the President more than once.”

This wasn’t theoretical. Harry Truman had been elected as Franklin Roosevelt’s vice president in 1944, but had only served 82 days when Roosevelt died in April 1945. That gave him virtually all of Roosevelt’s fourth four-year term.

Presidential tenure became a campaign issue in the 1946 midterm elections: Republicans gained 55 seats in the House and 12 in the Senate to take control of Congress for the first time since 1932.

Everything led back to Roosevelt. In 1940, he was approaching the end of his second term. George Washington had chosen to step down after eight years as president, and his model had become a moral and constitutional, if unofficial, exemplar.

Ulysses S. Grant came close to winning the Republican nomination for a third time in 1880; incredibly, despite a paralyzing stroke in 1919, Woodrow Wilson considered seeking a third term in 1920 and even entertained the idea of a comeback in 1924. But no-one had got as far as the ballot.

FDR’s third term was recognized as exceptional: the storm clouds of war were gathering and the Democrats played safe, Roosevelt winning 38 states.

1944 was different. Roosevelt was only 62 but he was suffering from congestive heart failure and hypertension.........

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