Most studies of the effects of term limits on state legislators' careers have focused solely on their propensity to seek other offices. An expected-utility analysis of the decision to run for office indicates that term limits reduce the benefits of seeking reelection, even for state legislators who are eligible to run, and reduce the opportunity cost of running for other offices. From this analysis, I develop a series of hypotheses about the probability that state legislators—term-limited or not—will seek re-election or other offices under a term limits regime, the value of the offices they seek, and the probability with which they will win these contests. I test these hypotheses using data on the career choices of state legislators in states with and without term limits in 2000-02. My empirical analysis supports the rational entry model and indicates that term limits have had a much richer effect on state legislative careers than previously understood.

By truncating service, term limits create massive turnover in some state legislatures where they exist, bringing flocks of newcomers into office. With less time to get to know each other and to develop expertise and influence, how do legislators know who to consult and whose advice to rely on? We explore this and other questions about three relationships (influence, friendship, and policy consultation) with a longitudinal study of the Michigan House of Representatives, a highly professionalized body with stringent limits on legislative terms. We found that term limits lead to a more pronounced regional component of friendship, greater concentration of influence among caucus leaders, consulting networks with more prominent hubs that could control the flow of information, and a decline in relationships across party lines. We argue that these effects of term limits bode poorly for bipartisan negotiation and consensus-building among legislators representing diverse constituencies.

Do term limits constrain a legislature's ability to produce complex and broad policy? I investigate this question by examining patterns of policymaking in six states before and after term limits went into effect in four of them. I find that term limits reduced policy complexity in three hybrid and citizen legislatures, while laws became increasingly intricate in the highly professional California legislature. I conclude that both the institutional context and experience of the term-limited legislators condition the effects of this reform on policymaking. In particular, a legislator's experience—in either state or local government—allows him or her to write broad and complex bills, and in legislatures that provide little staff support to compensate for the inexperience of their new members, term limits can reduce overall legislative policy knowledge, thus reducing the complexity of legislation.

Do term limits affect the probability that an incumbent state legislator will run for the United States Congress? The theory of strategic politicians suggests that by reducing legislators' opportunity costs of running for higher office, term limits should push some legislators into congressional campaigns they would have foregone had a long-term legislative career been an option. To test this hypothesis, I analyze data from congressional elections held from 1992 through 2004 in the 15 states where term limits were operative in 2004. I find that sitting state legislators who have hit the limit of their state legislative service are more likely to run for Congress than those who are eligible to serve additional terms, whether those terms are limited or not. However, there is no statistically significant difference between the congressional-candidacy rates of legislators whose re-election eligibility is limited, but not exhausted, and legislators whose terms are not limited. By increasing the supply of experienced challengers, term limits may increase competition in elections for non-term-limited offices and, consequently, the quality of representation provided by those elected.

The article assesses two predictions made by term limits advocates: that term limits would increase electoral competition and enhance demographic representation in state legislatures. Although term limits may indeed have these consequences in some places and some times, their early effects in Florida do not provide support for these predictions. Our analysis suggests that state legislative seats that have opened up as the result of term limits yielded races with no smaller margins of victory than in previous elections, nor were they more likely to be contested by the two major political parties. Likewise, we found no significant increase in the representation of minorities or women in the Florida State Legislature after term limits.