Term Limits Should be abolished

Now on to the argumentation but first observations: 1) Just to clarify I will be showing that term limits should not be abolished and so will place on myself a similar positive burden of proof my opponent has. 2) The affirmative case seems to utilize a general utilitarian principle, (Greatest Good for the Greatest Amount), and I accept this as a viable general impact calculus for the debate but as my opponent did not give a reason why that is the sole standard accept that we can also impact to more moral or deontological standards. 3) Since there is more literature available to us on a US specific debate I propose we limit ourself to that In order to negate this resolution I will attack the affirmative case and also TURN IT as such that it provides positive reasons to negate: On the affirmative case: FIRSTLY: The affirmative says the harms of term limits are that they disrupt long term planning. However I would say this is simply not true. Because the way the affirmative says I cause this harm is that we can't have the same president pushing these plans however even if the SAME president can't get elected, if he was going to get reelected someone with similar views would get elected. Allow me to further. The affirmative is basically caught in a double bind here: A) The president would win the election if he could run again. This means that his viewpoint/political party is popular. So someone who would push similar plans would be elected and the affirmative idea of long term policy making is still done in the negative world. B) The president's ideas/party are not popular enough to get re-elected in which case he probably would not get re-elected either. Remember term limits just means he can run again not that he is president for life. In which case the affirmative offers no advantage. SECONDLY: TURN the affirmative case against him, FDR became increasingly dictator like because of his long tenure and that was the reason they established term limits in the first place. He became increasingly powerful and overstepped his power many times, a big example is when he ignored congresses power over international affairs and lent out american military machines to the British, and outlined below are many other times he overstepped his powers. (10) Father Charles Coughlin, Social Justice (9th September, 1940) "On previous occasions Congressmen have called for the impeachment of the President. On those occasions most citizens disagreed with the Congressmen. At length, however, an event has transpired which now marks Franklin D. Roosevelt as a dangerous citizen of the Republic - dangerous insofar as he has transcended the bounds of his Executive position. In plain language, without the knowledge or consent of Congress, he has denuded this country of thirty-six flying fortresses, either selling or giving them to Great Britain. By this action Franklin D. Roosevelt had torpedoed our national defense, loving Great Britain more than the United States. He has consorted with the enemies of civilization - through the continued recognition of Soviet Russia. He has deceived the citizens of the United States - telling the newspaper reporters, who are the people's eyes and ears at Washington, that he did not know the whereabouts of these flying fortresses. He has transcended the bounds of his Executive position - spurning the authority of Congress. He has invited the enmity of powerful foreign nations- on whose natural resources we depend for essential tin and rubber. Because he has encouraged the British government to reopen the Burma Road, and encouraged Britain to declare war on the German government, when Britain was unable to care for the English people - he stands revealed as the world's chief war-monger. All these events, culminating with the transfer of these 36 flying fortresses without the consent of Congress, demand that he be impeached. " So you must reject this executive power unlimited tenure creates not only on a moral level but because it allows for an atmosphere of dictatorship, which causes massive harm to individual rights: The collapse of constitutional balance of power risks tyranny and reckless warmongering Martin Redish, Professor of Law and Public Policy at Northwestern, and Elizabeth Cisar, Law Clerk at the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals, 1991 41 Duke L. J. 449, pp. 472-3 "In any event, the political history of which the Framers were aware tends to confirm that quite often concentration of political power ultimately leads to the loss of liberty… widespread violations of individual rights took place when…Lincoln assumed an inordinate level of power, …Arguably as egregious were the threats to basic freedoms that arose during the Nixon administration,…Although in neither instance did the executive's usurpations of power ultimately degenerate into complete and irreversible tyranny, the reason for that may well have been the resilience of our political traditions, among the most important of which is separation of powers itself. In any event, it would be political folly to be overly smug about the security of either representative government or individual liberty. " SO each time we give presidents great authority and let them become near dictators we risk all our individual rights and risk our system collapsing into a quasi-monarchy. Just as quick outline of how you would vote from here look to the fact that I have taken out the affirmative case by showing how his logic in solving for the harms he presents contradict and then look to the fact that I have a viable "turn" on the affirmative case showing how his own points gives you a reason to vote for the negative. And so I urge a vote for the negative and will be glad to feild any questions my opponent has in his next speech if he should be willing to return the courtesy.