By Steve Brawner, © 2019 by Steve Brawner Communications, Inc.

Arkansans will vote on changing the state’s term limits law in 2020. In fact, they might vote on two proposals, and at the moment, they have the same name.

On Monday, the House voted 51-26 to advance the Arkansas Term Limits Amendment by Sen. Alan Clark, R-Lonsdale. It now is in the Senate, where it originated, for approval of a technical amendment. The first version passed that chamber, 27-3.

The proposed amendment would change the limit to 12 consecutive years of legislative service, and then legislators could run for office again after sitting out four years. Legislators currently are limited to 16 years combined in the House and Senate, plus two more for senators if they only served part of a term because lines are redrawn every 10 years after the census. Once term limited, they cannot return to the Legislature.

Clark told a committee March 19 that allowing legislators to return to the Capitol after that four-year break would let voters send back a Thomas Jefferson or Benjamin Franklin. Those legislators no longer would have the advantage of incumbency if they try to return. He said only about 5 percent of legislators are returnees in the states that have the provision.

Legislators are advancing the amendment partly because they want the body to maintain its institutional knowledge and competence so it can remain a co-equal branch of government alongside the executive and judicial branches.

A big motivation is the fact that term limits supporters outside the Legislature want to restrict terms even further than they are now. The group Arkansas Term Limits has already filed its own amendment with lifetime limits of 10 years. These would be the nation’s strictest. The proposal’s name: also the Arkansas Term Limits Amendment.

This will be the second time the group has proposed a 10-year limit. In 2018, it submitted a proposal with more than enough signatures from registered voters to qualify, but an Arkansas Supreme Court ruling struck it from the ballot.

The history here is really important. In 1992, almost 60 percent of voters approved limits of two four-year terms in the Senate and three two-year terms in the House. Then in 2014, legislators referred to voters a wide-ranging so-called “ethics amendment” that said somewhere in its long title it was “establishing” term limits. That amendment extended the limits to the current 16-18 years cumulative, which wasn’t what voters saw at the ballot box.

I’m not someone who always thinks the worst of elected officials, but that was sneaky. One of the main sponsors, Sen. Jon Woods of Springdale, has since been sentenced to 18 years in federal prison for unrelated corruption charges. In response, Arkansas Term Limits two years ago offered that 10-year proposal, which would have been even stricter than the original 1992 limits. Now it plans to try again with the same limits.

Clark said the Bureau of Legislative Research created the title when it drafted the bill, but it’s no secret that legislators are trying to head Arkansas Term Limits off at the pass. Perhaps this amendment could sate the public’s appetite for term limits. Also, while the legislators’ proposal has a mostly unimpeded path to the ballot, the citizen group must collect more than 89,000 registered voters’ signatures. Then it must survive the inevitable court challenge by someone. And the Arkansas Supreme Court tends to invalidate signatures for very technical reasons.

Meanwhile, someone will probably argue in court that two term limits measures would confuse the voters, and the Legislature’s qualified first. Arkansas Term Limits is considering what to do next.  Regardless, I would put my money on the Supreme Court finding a reason to come down on the Legislature’s side.

Let’s say they both somehow make the ballot. Which would you prefer – the current 16-18 years, 12 years with a chance to return after a break, or 10 years for life?

Steve Brawner is a syndicated columnist in Arkansas. Email him at brawnersteve@mac.com. Follow him on Twitter at @stevebrawner.