‘Third Termite’ Stages a Comeback : Reagan Admirer Heads Drive to Repeal Limit on Tenure

The old Third Termite is back. Just like clockwork.

Unheard of since 1973, when America last had a President serving his second term, the Termite--a usually derogatory reference to a third presidential term--is again chomping its way into the American political scene.

It is being aided in its advance by an unlikely crusader in an unlikely place: Bill Keenan, a graphic designer in Portland, just across the Columbia River from the other Washington, the one where such matters are not decided.

“With each passing day, I have become increasingly perplexed over the fact that I will not be able to vote for the person whom I feel to be the most qualified . . . for the reason that he has already served two terms,” Keenan says, explaining his drive to put Ronald Reagan in the White House for a third term.

Keenan is one of those curiosities of the American landscape: an average citizen of little political commitment who somehow, suddenly and quite unexpectedly, finds himself propelling a cause, working to right a perceived wrong. His previous political experience lay in designing buttons and bumper stickers. Now he wants to change the Constitution.

Pushed to Lead Campaign

“I never dreamed of Bill Keenan doing this,” he says, “but my Democratic father and sister kept pushing me: ‘You’ve got a responsibility to our democratic system. You know you should do it.’ Against my better judgment, I decided to jump in and do it. I felt I had a responsibility to get the word out.

“I realize I am small-time, and I didn’t think I had much of a chance, but I said, ‘Damn ‘em anyway.’ ”

Keenan is trying to revive national debate of one of the oldest questions of the American Republic: How long should a President stay in office? Keenan has set up a political action committee, called The Third Term, to raise funds, and has gone on the radio talk-show circuit to push for repeal of the 22nd Amendment to the Constitution. Since 1951, it has limited presidents to two terms.

He wants the repeal accomplished in time for Reagan to run again and serve four more years.

Keenan is not alone.

Republicans Back Effort

Last month, about 300 Reagan supporters rallied in Lafayette Park, across Pennsylvania Avenue from the White House, to call for repeal of the 22nd Amendment. Rep. Guy Vander Jagt (R-Mich.) has sent out 300,000 letters seeking support of the repeal effort.

“If Ronald Reagan could have even one more term in office, I’m confident he will set this nation on a course of prosperity, opportunity and security which will carry us well into the 21st Century,” said Vander Jagt, who has introduced legislation for the repeal.

(Some observers have labeled the effort a fund-raising gimmick because, in calling for repeal, Vander Jagt, who is chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee, also asked for contributions to help elect Republican congressmen this year.)

“It’s starting to have a life of its own,” Keenan said of the drive recently. “Something’s going to happen.”

A two-term limit on the presidency was an American political custom that began with a George Washington weary of public life and ended when Franklin Delano Roosevelt sought a third term in 1940. The Republican response then was swift, and the Third Termite was born. “No Third Term-ites!” and “Out Stealing Third!” became campaign rallying cries. Parade balloons caricatured the Third Termite, who also appeared in the Pogo comic strip.

Old Political Issue

Just how long a President should be allowed had long been an issue, however. In 1947, Congressional Digest counted 125 resolutions, introduced in Congress since 1890, to limit presidential tenure. One would have limited it to five years, 79 of them advocated six years, three were for seven years, three for eight years, and 14 of the resolutions sought a limit of two, four-year terms.

In 1940, though, the debate raged right down to the election for the first time in the nation’s history. Roosevelt went on to serve a third term and was elected to a fourth. The movement to limit presidential tenure grew. Proponents saw the limitation as a curb on what then seemed a worldwide trend toward dictatorship.

“Without rotation in the office of President, I do not see how we can hope to escape a dictatorship,” argued Sen. Arthur Capper (R-Kan.) in congressional testimony in 1945. “There is some ground for the assertion that the difference between a good dictator and a bad dictator is just a matter of time.”

“A democracy must develop through the advancement of principles and programs, and not by way of idolatrous belief in leaders,” said Rep. Charles M. La Follette (R-Ind.) in a 1946 article in the Christian Science Monitor.

Reflection on Roosevelt

Writing opposite La Follette, Rep. Estes Kefauver (D-Tenn.) referred to the objections to Roosevelt’s third term: “We were seriously told that there would be no more elections, and that soon we would be more or less an enslaved people. Need we answer these objections? Would any man seriously contend now that, then or since, we have become a dictatorship, when we are the shining light of democracy in the whole world?”

Unable to stop Roosevelt at the polls, the Republican-controlled Congress sought to exact its revenge in 1947. On the opening day of Congress that year, Republicans proposed constitutional amendments to limit the presidency to two four-year terms and one six-year term, respectively.

Eventually, Congress approved a resolution fixing 10 years as the maximum time anyone could serve in the White House. No one could be elected President more than twice, and anyone who served out more than two years of another President’s term could be elected only once in his own right.

On Feb. 26, 1951, the 22nd Amendment to the Constitution, also known as “the anti-Roosevelt amendment,” became law when Nevada became the 36th state to ratify it. Utah had done so earlier the same day.

Republicans Were Affected

With time, the political axiom became: “The Republicans aimed at Roosevelt and hit Eisenhower.” Later came Nixon, and then Reagan--all Republicans. Not since Roosevelt has any Democrat been reelected President.

Minor efforts to repeal the 22nd Amendment were launched in 1959 and in 1973, but Eisenhower disavowed the idea of a third term and Nixon resigned in disgrace before he could finish his second.

So now the Third Termite is back. Just like clockwork.

“I wanted to support some candidate in 1988, and I thought, there has got to be some Democrat out there taking on some of the Ronald Reagan agenda,” says Keenan, a self-described moderate and registered Democrat who says he voted for Jimmy Carter in 1976, John Anderson in 1980 and Reagan in 1984.

“Then I started thinking about the 22nd Amendment. I thought it would take years to repeal--but Prohibition was repealed in 10 months--and at that point I felt I had a responsibility to get the word out.”

So, last April 24, Keenan declared the battle begun and the political action committee formed. Soon he was getting some notice--a radio program in Seattle, an article in the Seattle Times, mention in The New York Times and a quotation in USA Today, followed by a talk show appearance in San Francisco.

Contribution Rolls In

“How could a guy out in Oregon who nobody knows--why would they send me money?” he mused, a day after he received his first contribution, $10--the fruit of the San Francisco talk show appearance--to the political action committee. “I’ve spent less than $100 myself, and I’ve had tremendous impact getting debate going.

“But there are times when I couldn’t put out a press release because I couldn’t afford $10 in stamps or I had to get to work to pay the house mortgage.”

Keenan hopes to tie up the Republican nomination process until the 1988 convention. He is urging the backing of favorite-son candidates in the primaries, to buy time to allow three-fourths of the states to vote for repeal. Vander Jagt has asked for prompt committee action on his resolution for repeal.

Reagan has said that he favors repeal--for future presidents. “Any President who will try to get the Constitution changed should not be doing it for himself,” he told a Miami crowd in July as supporters chanted: “Four more years!”

‘It’s Only Democratic’

“He should be doing it for those who will follow him,” the President went on. “I think it should be changed, because I think it’s only democratic for the people to be able to vote for someone as many times as they want.”

Whatever Reagan thinks about a third term for himself, Keenan intends to stay the course. “I don’t oppose the 22nd Amendment because I support Ronald Reagan,” he said, “but if it weren’t for my support of Reagan I wouldn’t be doing it right now. There’s no better way to demonstrate the absurdity of a two-term amendment than to dangle a popular President people want to vote for and then snatch him away and say, ‘Sorry, you can’t do it.’

“The responsibility is on the Reagan people to raise the issue, because it’s our rights that are being trampled on. I’m not looking for support from Reagan people who don’t really support this in principle. Historically, Republicans have not been good on this issue.

“This nation isn’t going to tolerate any dictatorial trend. If I thought that was a possibility, I wouldn’t be doing this. I don’t want to go down in history as the guy who made America safe for a dictatorship.”