Congress Term Limits Set by Initiative Voided : Government: A federal judge throws out part of Washington state’s law, saying such curbs would require an amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

Throwing a chill over America’s spreading voter revolt, a federal judge ruled Thursday that term limits cannot be imposed on members of Congress by way of ballot initiative.

Only by changing the U.S. Constitution can terms of federal officeholders be restricted, U.S. District Judge William L. Dwyer said.

His decision invalidating part of Washington state’s term limit law was a sweet first-step victory for House Speaker Thomas S. Foley (D-Wash.) and the system of congressional seniority. It also was a potentially ruinous setback for growing legions of discontented Americans bent on a congressional purge.

In the past three years, term limits for U.S. senators and representatives have become the national steam vent for voter frustration--with ballot propositions passing one after another in 15 states, including California.

Backers of the idea are pushing similar initiatives in eight more states this year.

But Dwyer ruled that, no matter how fervent their frustration, voters cannot “add substantive requirements” for candidacy for federal office beyond those written in the Constitution.

Article I specifies only three such qualifications for the House of Representatives: a minimum age of 25, citizenship for at least seven years and state residency. For the Senate: a minimum age of 30, citizenship for at least nine years and state residency.

“If adopted as a complete bar to reelection, a term limit law would exclude a category of candidates qualified under Article I: those who have served for a certain time,” Dwyer wrote in a 36-page summary decision.

The landmark case was argued at the most fundamental level: Exactly what were the intentions of the framers of the U.S. Constitution?

To that, Dwyer answered, the founders of the nation adopted only the shortest list of qualifications to protect the “indisputable right” of voters to “return whom they thought proper” to Congress.

Dwyer noted that political fancies come and go.

Today, voters want to bring fresh blood into Congress and shake up the system of incumbency. But, the judge pointed out, if voters were given free rein to define the qualifications for candidacy, the winds may shift and they could decide that only candidates with prior electoral experience could run for Congress. That would not be fair either, he said.

“A state may not diminish its voters’ constitutional freedom of choice by making would-be candidates for Congress ineligible on the basis of incumbency or history of congressional service,” the judge said.

Whether “term limits are wise or foolish” was not for him to decide, Dwyer wrote, adding that Americans only have one choice if they wish to proceed: a constitutional amendment, such as the 22nd Amendment, which limited presidents to two elected terms.

Dwyer’s ruling applies only to the state of Washington. But this case is certain to move on toward the U.S. Supreme Court, where the nation could look for a uniform application of constitutional doctrine.

With Foley and the congressional incumbency on one side and voter majorities on the other, the stakes are too weighty for anything less: the advantage in shaping, and perhaps controlling, the U.S. Congress in the 21st Century.

“Terrible decision! We’re appealing immediately,” said Chris Marks of the Washington, D.C.-based advocacy group U.S. Term Limits.

Marks said he believed that Thursday’s decision would spur grass-roots organizers to redouble their efforts on the 1994 ballot measures.

In addition to the eight states where congressional term limit drives are under way, Marks said, about 600 local term limit propositions are being advanced this year.

In a brief statement, Foley--a 14-term congressman--said: “I believe that this decision provides an important framework for the resolution of one of the most important constitutional questions of the decade.

“My own view is that a constitutional amendment is the only way term limits can be implemented,” Foley said.

His attorney, Stephen Smith, said the ruling “best protects the constitutional rights of all citizens.”

“Accepting the sponsors’ arguments would have created a disastrous precedent in which many types of candidates could be barred from the ballot simply because a group of voters did not wish them to participate,” Smith said.

This case represented the consolidation of two suits filed against Washington state’s 1992 term limit law--one by the League of Women Voters and another on behalf of a suburban Seattle voter. They were soon joined by Foley, 10-term Rep. Henry J. Hyde (R-Ill.) and the American Civil Liberties Union. Among the lawyers representing their side was Lloyd Cutler, White House counsel in the Jimmy Carter Administration.

Defending the statute was the state of Washington, the initiative’s grass-roots sponsors, U.S. Term Limits and the Pacific Legal Foundation. Their defense team included former Carter Administration Atty. Gen. Griffin B. Bell.

Dwyer’s ruling would appear to have little consequence for term limits imposed by voters on state or local officeholders. That portion of the Washington law was not challenged. The U.S. Supreme Court already refused to hear a challenge to California’s legislative term limits, which were passed in 1990.

The invalidated portion of Washington’s law, similar to California’s 1992 federal term limit proposition, would have permitted members of Congress three consecutive terms and senators two.

Foley would have been allowed to serve in the House through 1998; then his name would have been banned from the ballot, although he could seek office as a write-in candidate.

The terms of other initiatives differ by state, but their cumulative effect--if ultimately left standing--would likely change the character of Congress.

That was exactly the aim of term limit sponsors. In oral arguments last month, Bell put it this way: “We’re asking, what are the limits on the power of the people?”

Besides Washington and California, the other states that have adopted term limits for congressional candidates are Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Florida, Michigan, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, Oregon, South Dakota and Wyoming.

Times researcher Doug Conner assisted with this story.