Democrats Nominate FDR for Unprecedented 3rd Term

• Author: Allen Pusey
• Pages: 72-72

In June 1799, two years after

he said farewell to the nation’s

rst presidential administration,

George Washington was ap-

proached by Jonathan Trumbull Jr., a

close friend and a former speaker of

the House of Representatives, about

running for a third term as president.

A year earlier, Washington’s successor,

John Adams, had prevailed upon him

to once again lead the nation’s army.

The French Revolution was in a death

spiral, and some, including Washing-

ton, feared the outbreak of a war with

France. Because of that, Trumbull be-

lieved Washington would be receptive.

But Washington, having retired after

two terms in ofce, remained faithful to

the precedent he himself had set: that

serving beyond two terms might suggest

the ofce was intended for a ruler, not a

democratically elected leader. Moreover,

he didn’t care for the emerging polit-

ical climate. Politicians of the day, he

wrote Trumbull, “regard neither truth

nor decency; attacking every character

without respect to persons—public or

private—who happen to differ from

themselves in politics.”

Washington’s disinclination was

reinforced when Thomas Jefferson

refused to offer himself for a third term.

Although no constitutional prohibi-

tion existed against it, the two-term

limitation remained unchallenged until

the Republican National Convention

of 1880, when a cadre of Republicans

known as the Stalwarts tried to nom-

inate Ulysses S. Grant for an unprece-

dented third term as president.

Though Grant’s two-term tenure

ending in 1877 had been plagued by

scandal, Grant retained a personal pop-

ularity undiminished after he left ofce.

By nominating him anew, the Stalwarts

hoped to stave off federal civil service

reforms that threatened traditional po-

litical patronage. Grant never publicly

acknowledged the campaign, but he

entered the Republican convention in

Chicago as the front-runner. But after

36 ballots, the nomination ultimately

went to James Gareld.

The two-term limitation was once

again tested in 1912 by Theodore Roo-

sevelt. Angered by the reversal of some

of his progressive policies, Roosevelt re-

neged on an earlier promise not

to seek a third presidential

term to challenge his

Republican succes-

sor, William Taft.

But Roosevelt’s

“inordinate

ambition”

became an

important

issue. Re-

jected by the

Republicans,

he ran an

unsuccessful

campaign as a

candidate for the

Progressive Party.

Roosevelt’s rst term

resulted from the assassi-

nation of William McKinley. Because

he had already served more than three

years, Roosevelt at rst considered his

election to a full term of ofce a second

term. Though he later abandoned that

view, his defeat mooted

the third-term issue until Calvin

Coolidge took ofce after the death of

Warren Harding. Coolidge was elected

in 1924 but famously refused to run

four years later, and the “third-term

issue” was once again moot.

But by 1940, after more than a

decade of global economic depression,

dramatic government reform and war

metastasizing across Europe, the likely

reelection of Democrat Franklin Delano

Roosevelt to a once-unimaginable third

elected term brought renewed vigor

to the two-term issue. In deference to

those concerns, Roosevelt declared his

delegates free to vote their conscience

at the nominating convention. But on

July 18, he was nominated on the rst

ballot, the rst president ever nominat-

ed by his party for a third term.

That violation of convention became

a rallying point for his Republican

opponent, Wendell Willkie. And even

the Democrat-controlled Senate held 16

days of hearings on the third-term issue

prior to the November election.

Still, Willkie lost handily,

no congressional action

was taken, and U.S.

entry into World

War II in 1941

obviated any

political con-

cerns about

Roosevelt’s

election to

a fourth

term in 1944.

By the time

of Roosevelt’s

death in April

1945, the issue

had moved to the

forefront of American

politics. It became a regular

question in Gallup polls, which showed

considerable support for a constitu-

tional amendment to codify a two-term

precedent.

In 1947, Congress approved the

22nd Amendment. It was ratied by

three-fourths of the 48 states in Febru-

ary 1951 after Minnesota became the

36th state to do so. Q

Democrats Nominate FDR

for Unprecedented 3rd Term

BY ALLEN PUSEY

Precedents

72

JULY 18, 1940

Franklin

Delano

Roosevelt

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