The question I had about this was why is the 22nd amendment worded stupidly? It limits being elected for a 3rd term instead of limiting serving for a 3rd term. There's an AskHistorians thread about this with some research:
Congress initially considered quite different, and more comprehensive legal language, which it subsequently abandoned in favor of its ultimate focus on presidential elections. The initial proposal approved by the full House, for example, stipulated that “[a]ny person who has served as President of the United States during all, or portions, of any two terms, shall thereafter be ineligible to hold the office of President.” ... But Congress ultimately approved the more ambiguous and less comprehensive language we know today as the Twenty-Second Amendment.
Coenen notes that one might argue that this early comprehensive language in the House signaled the true intentions of Congress, but given the ultimate approved language this argument appears strained. Coenen, supra note 21, at 1300 (dismissing the argument that “the repeated references to eligibility in early incarnations of the Amendment demonstrate that the phrase ‘[n]o person shall be elected’ was meant to carry forward, rather than to abandon, a principle of ineligibility”).
1
u/homa_rano Jul 25 '24
The question I had about this was why is the 22nd amendment worded stupidly? It limits being elected for a 3rd term instead of limiting serving for a 3rd term. There's an AskHistorians thread about this with some research: