State politics in Vermont are a little peculiar. Only in Vermont and in next door New Hampshire does the governor serve for only two years before having to run again for reelection. In Vermont that is the way it has been since 1878. Every other state has a four year term for Governor.
Most states used to have two year terms, and 15 states even used to have one year terms (including Vermont). But most switched long ago. Fully 17 states switched to four year terms in the 19th century. Two latecomers were Arkansas, which waited until 1986, and Rhode Island, which did not make the move until 1994.
Term limits is another, related issue that is peculiar in Vermont. Twelve other states have no term limits, but only Vermont and New Hampshire have no term limits combined with two year terms.
But in Vermont the picture of term limits is muddled by ingrained past practices that were never codified in law but closely followed in practice. In the case of term limits, there was an informal understanding that no Governor would serve more than two terms.
Two other idiosyncratic political practices have to do with geography. Vermont is split down the middle by a mountain range—the Green Mountains. In the days before the modern travel and communications, the left side of the state had little to do with the right side of the state. Each side also had issues unique to their side of the state. That led to the “Mountain Rule.” From roughly the decades just before the Civil War to the 1940s the Governorship alternated—without exception—between an “eastsider” and a “westsider.” That rule was also followed with the Lieutenant Governor, but in the opposite way. When an “eastside” held the Governorship, a “westsider” held the Lieutenant Governorship. That is, a Governor from one side of the state always served with a Lieutenant Governor from the other side.
Following that same rule, in the years before 1913, Vermont’s two Senators were always selected so that one Senator was from the eastside while the other was from the westside.