Two senators from each state -- serving simultaneously?

Senate elections are staggered by two years. E. g. one senator in a state is elected in, say, 2010 and the other for that state in 2012. Terms take six years, so the first senator in our example would be up for reelection in 2016 whereas the second would be in 2018. About 1/3 of all senate seats are up for each term, so for the 100 senators, about 33 seats would be up for election in 2016, another 33 in 2018, and the other 33 or 34 seats in 2020.

A monkey wrench is thrown into this when someone leaves office, e. g. they might run for president and win, or they resign or are impeached, or they die in office. All of these things have happened. An interim senator is generally appointed (I believe by the governor of that state although I am uncertain) and a special election is held if it's not too close to when a regular election would come around again. E. g. if the first senator in our example becomes ill and resigns in August of 2016, just three or so months before reelection time, I doubt there would be a special election held (although there might be). But if that same senator left, instead, in 2013, then there would definitely be a special election held.

If a special election is held - in my example that would be in 2013 - the term does not change. Hence that special election would only be for a term lasting until 2016, and then it would all go back to the usual schedule.

Yes...they do both serve at the same time.

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Senate

Term

Senators serve terms of six years each; the terms are staggered so that approximately one-third of the seats are up for election every two years. This was achieved by dividing the senators of the 1st Congress into thirds (called classes), where the terms of one-third expired after two years, the terms of another third expired after four, and the terms of the last third expired after six years. This arrangement was also followed after the admission of new states into the union. The staggering of terms has been arranged such that both seats from a given state are not contested in the same general election, except when a mid-term vacancy is being filled. Current senators whose six-year terms expire on January 3, 2015, belong to Class II.

Interestingly, in the next election in 2016, the Presidency will be on the line, but so will 26 Republican Senate seats, only about 10 Democrats.

Joe(karma)Nation

Yes, but after the 2013 gun control debacle, 2016 is going to be a Republican year, so it should be little problem.

The what?

Look, the GOP is now going to have to show it knows how to govern rather than just oppose. They can't; this current crop of Republicans don't know anything except how to be in opposition.
I predict them to be abject failures and expose that ineptness in various ways to their detriment and, I hope, their ultimate dissolution as a political party.
Look how well their "personhood" idea went over in this most recent election.

Joe(terrible idea, well rejected even by the people voting for the GOP)Nation

Back in 2013 there was a big debacle where President Obama wasted all of his political capital in a futile frontal assault against the NRA.

Consequently, he now has no political capital with which to achieve anything at all.

There is a small chance that immigration reform will happen, but if it does, it will not happen because of Mr. Obama, but because Republican leaders decide they want to pass it.

By 2016 it will have been a long six years since Mr. Obama got any legislation passed through Congress. The voters will be more than ready to make a change by then.



About all that is required of them is that they pass budgets that the President is willing to sign (unless they can override a veto, but they probably can't).

They may or may not decide to have more budget showdowns, but in the end it will not change the reality that 2016 will take place with the backdrop of Mr. Obama having not achieved any legislation in six years.

I like Hillary (much more than I like Bill). She seems nice, and is suitably militant toward those little troublemaker countries. However, I'm probably going to cross party lines and vote in the Republican primary in 2016. The way I see it, since the Republicans are guaranteed a win in the general, we best make sure we nominate the best possible Republican.

I hear Jeb is thinking of running. I could do with another 8 years of Bush presidency. The Bush family is always a good safe reliable choice, IMO.

I've also heard that Romney might go again if Jeb bows out. Good solid businessman there. Another fine choice.

I don't know much about this Cruz guy, but I've heard people say he has the potential to be another Reagan.

And of course the fat guy from Jersey (sorry I forget his name, I swear I'm not trying to be rude to him) vetoed the attempted ban on .50 BMG sniper rifles in his state. It's always nice to see an American politician stand up to the Freedom Haters.

We didn't have that in Michigan. We had faux wolf hunting proposals instead.

Our legislature passed a law allowing wolf hunting, and some foreign Communist types got enough petitions signed to have the measure placed on the ballot for voter approval.

Our legislature responded by passing another law allowing wolf hunting, which superseded the first law, and those foreign Communist types came back with more petitions that got that one put on the ballot for voter approval as well.

So our legislature passed yet another law allowing wolf hunting, which superseded the first two laws, and which was immune to ballot approval requirements.

The end result was that we had two statewide ballot proposals regarding wolf hunting, and neither one had any legal effect whatsoever.

Oddly enough, everybody seems to have still bothered to vote on the proposals. I wonder if most voters didn't realize that it was a pointless vote.

Both measures were voted down. Michigan's first wolf-hunting season starts next year.