What's the significance of 14 years, why did the government decided that a president has to live in the US for 14 years before running, as opposed to another # of years?
2006-10-23 12:40:04 · 6 answers · asked by EGGO 2 in Politics & Government ➔ Elections
What's the significance of 14 years, why did the government decided that a president has to live in the US for 14 years before running, as opposed to another # of years?
*I know that the president HAS to be a US citizen, I just want to know the answer to why she has to live in the US for 14 years as opposed to 10, or 7.
2006-10-23 12:53:02 · update #1
In order to be president you have to have been born a citizen, so it doens't matter how long you've lived here, if you weren't born here you cannot be president. Arnold schwartzenegger cannot run for the presidency, even though he's gubernator of CA. There was some talk of changing the law just so he could run, but let's just all hope that doesn't happen.
2006-10-23 12:49:17 · answer #1 · answered by orphanannie 3 · 2⤊ 1⤋
US Constitution, Article 2, Section 1, Paragraph 5, "No person except a natural born citizen, or a citizen of the United States, at the time of the adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the office of President; neither shall any person be eligible to that office who shall not have attained to the age of thirty five years, and been four-teen Years a resident within the United States."
The reason for the time of residency requirement was to insure that the candidate for President at least had had time to become familiar with what was going on in the country. They did not want dome carpet bagger, expatriate showing up and running for President. Why 14 years? It was probably the compromise number that everyone in that final meeting of the Continental Congress could agree on. Considering the slow rate at which news traveled back then, it was probably a very reasonable length of time.
2006-10-23 20:07:59 · answer #2 · answered by Glenn Blaylock 2 · 2⤊ 1⤋
The age at which a person becomes an adult used to be 21.The minimum age to be president is 35.That is a 14 year difference.I believe this is how they came up with the number.Meaning that the prior 14 years before you ran you were a legal adult.
2006-10-24 01:20:08 · answer #3 · answered by stellablue1959 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
It was based on debate rather than some other basis. The residency requirement was to assure the public that no foreign king would rule them and a term of 14 years seemed to be adequete. Other debate has followed on all of the requirements for presidency.
The link below describes some of the debate on residency requirements for the senate.
2006-10-23 20:30:01 · answer #4 · answered by sdh0407 5 · 1⤊ 0⤋
they want to make sure that the president is familiar with US history and current events in the US and around the globe.
2006-10-23 22:57:25 · answer #5 · answered by yellabanana77 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
So Arnold can run.
2006-10-23 19:52:30 · answer #6 · answered by kevin_4508 5 · 0⤊ 2⤋