The study also found that term limits failed to reduce the number of legislators who view politics as profession, one of the promises of the 1990s government reform movement that initially led 21 states to limit legislative terms.
Today, term limits remain in effect in 15 states.
But the report, compiled by the National Conference of State Legislatures, the Council on State Governments and the State Legislative Leaders Foundation, questions whether they've done much to improve how legislatures operate.
Perhaps, though, the study asks the wrong questions.
Those who believed that term limits were going to be the panacea to fix all that is wrong in government were kidding themselves from the outset.
The long-standing arguments against term limits - reducing legislative power in favor of executive branch power, empowering legislative staff, reducing lawmakers' institutional knowledge - always had merit. The arguments for term limits - forcing turnover, increasing electoral competition and reducing special interest influence - had merit as well.
Of course, this study, like all social science, isn't exact science. You can't put politicians in test tubes. (On second thought, you could put them in really big ones, plug their tops and perhaps reduce hot air and global warming. But that experiment wouldn't prove anything about term limits.)
No, the study findings were largely derived from questions put to legislators, lobbyists and legislative staffers. Not surprisingly, the authors found that, just like people everywhere, the political class isn't really fond of change.
Whether in Arizona or Ohio, respondents said that, once term limits were established, the legislative process became "more chaotic."
In Arizona, the researchers found that term limits reduced the influence of legislative leaders.
"Still, interviews suggested term limits have made life far more difficult for legislative leaders to control members," the researchers wrote.
In Ohio, respondents also reported "legislators more independent."
So, legislators acting independent of legislative leaders is a bad thing? Legislators following the dictates of conscience and constituents rather than the wishes of someone who may live 400 miles from that person's district hurts representative democracy?
Concluding that term limits have increased the power of governors at the expense of legislators and ratcheted up partisanship also seems questionable.
Incivility and partisanship are on the rise in Congress and legislatures across the country. And during the same period that term limits have been adopted in other states, North Carolina has seen executive branch power increase as well, with the first gubernatorial vetoes in the state's history taking place.
This isn't to suggest that North Carolina should dive into the term-limits pool. But in an era of unprecedented power by legislative leaders, which has surely come at the expense of rank-and-file legislators, limiting legislative terms shouldn't be casually dismissed either.
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