When terms of office end and begin
Official text rightpowerlimitif conditionlegal term
The terms of the President and Vice President shall end at noon on the 20th day of January, and the terms of Senators and Representatives at noon on the 3d day of January, of the years in which such terms would have ended if this article had not been ratified; and the terms of their successors shall then begin.
Proposal and ratification: The twentieth amendment to the Constitution was proposed to the legislatures of the several states by the Seventy-Second Congress, on the 2d day of March, 1932, and was declared, in a proclamation by the Secretary of State, dated on the 6th day of February, 1933, to have been ratified by the legislatures of 36 of the 48 States. was completed on January 23, 1933.
Simplified explanation
The terms of the President and Vice President end at noon on the 20th day of January, and those of Senators and Representatives at noon on the 3d day of January; the terms of their successors then begin.