I arrived at the perception of the subtle question as I attempted to defend this sentence — over at the new Bloggingheads episode — "On The Glenn Show, Glenn and Ann check in on Obama a year into his second term." It's only 8 months since the second inauguration, 2/3 of a year. Someone pointed out that it's just inaccurate to say "a year into his second term," but — even though it's not my assertion — I felt called to defend it. My first — and boring — effort at defense was to say: it was rounding.
My second effort was: "Some people may feel that after the election, the new term (in spirit) begins."
My interlocutor said:
But even under that view (which would raise awkward questions about when his administration is going to end, when the Bush administration ended, and whether Obama's two terms are of equal length), it still isn't one year into his second term. The election was in November, not September.I could combine my 2 arguments and say the rounding up is less egregious when you take 8 and a half months up to a year, but at that point I lost interest in the question whether the above-quoted statement is defensible because I saw the subtlety of the question that became the post title.
Here's my thinking. Each presidential term begins on the 20th of January following an election that occurs on the Tuesday after the first Monday in November. That's about an 11-week gap. Let's commit to the idea that first term of a 2-term presidency does not begin until he becomes President, because despite all the attention he gets and the lameness of the actual President, he doesn't have presidential power. But after the election to a second term, he is already President and he's gotten the affirmation that he will continue in the presidency for a second term. Reelection suddenly vaults him to the stature of a 2-term President, and he's got 4 years and 11 weeks in a forthcoming unbroken unit of power.
In this view — which is practical and not formal — the second term is 22 weeks longer than the first term. Notice that this analysis doesn't require you to say that the previous presidency ended on Election Day or that the second term will end on Election Day. The added length of the second term comes from the early end to the first term.
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I agree that the second term begins as soon as the president wins reelection. If the president loses his re-election bid, then he effectively stops being president at that point. What's left is little more than waiting for the lease on the White House to run out, when, as his final act as president, he grants a series of meritless pardons.
Re-election means that he continues being president, not from the re-swearing in, but from the moment of reelection.
Nevertheless, the second term is much shorter--not longer--than the first. Lame duck status sets in much quicker this second time. Within a year or two of reelection, his authority begins to drain away and by the time of the third House election, two years in, most of the government is simply waiting for him to go away.
That useless empty period that is only about 10 weeks for a one-term president is closer to two years for a two-term president.
Does vacation time and/or campaigning affect the math? :)
One term will be longer because of leap year.
Lamus Duckus
The 11 week bonus after re-election would be offset bt the 11 week weakness after the replacement was elected.
But that 2nd term can get to seem like forever!
Lame duck status may begin almost immediately after the president's second inauguration. That's certainly the case with Obama.
Obama's second term is going to seem excruciatingly long, even to his supporters. The beat of time will slow as he drones on. And drones and drones and drones.
In terms of power, Obama's first term ended with the expiration of the Pelosi Congress following the 2010 election. The 2012 election made no difference, and we have yet to see whether he will be rejuvenated by a third term in 2014 or suffer the loss of the Reid Senate.
This is absurd. The second term begins on January 20th when he is sworn in again. If the president dies in December after being reelected to a second term, the new president is the vice president of the first term. If the vice president elect is a different person than the vice president, he does not take office until January 20th. Thus, no one can say truthfully that the term begins with the election.
Also, the president is not elected on election day, he is elected by the electoral college, who does not meet until Monday after the second Wednesday in December.
Well, a President elected in 2096 and reelected in 2100 will have his first term be one day longer than his second term.
If John Adams had won a second term it would have been one day longer than his first term, for 1800 was not a leap year, but 1804 was. Likewise, if William McKinley had served his full second term, it would have been one day longer than his first term, for 1900 was not a leap year, but 1904 was. This could happen again in 2100, which will not be a leap year (note that 2000 was a leap year because while years divisible by 100 are not leap years, years divisible by 400 are, thanks to Pope Gregory XIII).
A larger difference was averted when Franklin Roosevelt died in his fourth term. If he had served the full fourth term it would have been 43 days shorter than his third term, since inauguration day was moved from March 4 to January 20, effective in 1949.
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