There is some speculation that Minneapolis mayor R.T. Rybak would run for governor of Minnesota in 2010 (something I would love to see, and at this point would definitely support him). And this lead us to a discussion the other morning about whether our current governor could or would run again, and that lead us to an attempt to figure out if governors had term limits.
And the answer in Minnesota is no.
The Council of State Governments' Book of the States outlines which states follow which practices for state official term limits. (Found via National Governors Association). And it varies from state to state -- some have two-year terms, most have four-year terms; many allow no more than two consecutive terms, others have no term limits in place at all.
The Book of the States (an annual publication) publishes just about everything one may need to know about a state's government, and includes that hard-to-find information along with an expert essay about state trends. (I have never seen this publication -- I work with a small print reference collection, and it doesn't seem to be published in its entirety anywhere on the web).
Another aspect of the governorship that varies in eight states is succession. In most states the lieutenant governor takes over, but in eight states it could be the secretary of state or the speaker of the senate. And, Oregon is the only state that does not have any tools in place to impeach a governor.
1 comment:
Hey, I just helped someone last week who was looking up the exact same question. Actually, she had found the answer the same way you had, and had come to me to ask how to cite the pages from the Book of the States that were posted on the NGA website. Turns out we have the Book of the States in the library, so I had her look at that and cite it specifically. It ended up being one of the more interesting citation questions I'd had (I hate citation questions usually), since it brought up questions of authorship and the primary source, etc. Heh, something only a librarian would find interesting..
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