How Florida State Government Is Built: Three Branches, Their Size and Their Terms

Article II, section 3 of the Florida Constitution divides state government into legislative, executive and judicial branches and bars a person in one branch from exercising the powers of another unless the constitution expressly allows it (Florida Constitution, Article II, section 3).

Tallahassee is the constitutional home of every branch. Article II, section 2 requires the governor, lieutenant governor, cabinet officers and supreme court to keep their offices in the Leon County capital and the Legislature to hold its sessions there; only invasion or grave emergency lets the governor relocate it, by proclamation, for as long as the emergency lasts (Article II, section 2).

The Florida Department of State's quick facts sum up the form of government as a governor and a cabinet made up of the Attorney General, Chief Financial Officer and Commissioner of Agriculture, with a Legislature of 120 house districts and 40 senate districts, and 67 counties (Florida Department of State, Florida quick facts).

Sources: Florida Constitution for every row; Florida Senate, Senators for the count of 40 senators now serving.

The governor holds the supreme executive power of Florida and is commander-in-chief of the state's military forces not in federal service, under Article IV, section 1 (Article IV, section 1).

The lieutenant governor has no fixed portfolio in the constitution: Article IV, section 2 assigns the office the duties pertaining to the governor's office that the governor assigns, plus any prescribed by law (Article IV, section 2). The Executive Office of the Governor identifies the current officeholder as Ron DeSantis, the 46th Governor of Florida, and its site shows the governor making appointments, such as an October 16, 2026 appointment to the Treasure Coast Regional Planning Council (Executive Office of the Governor).

Three more statewide elected officers, the attorney general, chief financial officer and commissioner of agriculture, form the cabinet, and on a tie vote of the governor and cabinet the side on which the governor voted prevails; the separate Florida cabinet guide covers what each of them does (Article IV, section 4).

The departments that carry out state programs are capped. Article IV, section 6 allots all executive functions among not more than twenty-five departments, not counting those the constitution itself provides for, and places each under the governor, the lieutenant governor, the governor and cabinet, a cabinet member, or an officer or board serving at the governor's pleasure. The constitution names several of its own, including the Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, the Department of Veterans' Affairs and the Department of Elderly Affairs in Article IV, sections 9, 11 and 12 (Article IV, sections 6 to 12).

The Florida Legislature has two houses, a Senate of members elected from senatorial districts and a House of Representatives of members elected from representative districts, each choosing its own presiding officer (Article III, sections 1 and 2).

Sources: Florida Constitution for district ranges, terms, officers and the 8 year limit; Department of State quick facts and Florida Senate for the districts in use.

To sit in either Florida chamber a member needs to be 21 or older, an elector and resident of the district, and a resident of the state for the two years before the election. Members take office as soon as they are elected, and a vacant seat can be filled only by an election (Article III, section 15).

The Legislature also keeps its own auditor, appointed to serve at its pleasure to audit public records, and each house designates a Secretary (Senate) or Clerk (House) to serve at its pleasure (Article III, section 2).

If the office of Florida governor becomes vacant, the lieutenant governor becomes governor for the remainder of the term, and the Legislature sets any further line of succession by law (Article IV, section 3).

Article IV, section 3 also covers temporary gaps. During an impeachment trial of the governor, or while the governor is incapacitated, the lieutenant governor acts as governor. The Florida Supreme Court may determine incapacity after three cabinet members docket a written suggestion of it, and restoration is decided the same way on a suggestion from the governor, the Legislature or three cabinet members (Article IV, section 3).

Appointments are not entirely the governor's alone. When a law designates a statutory office, Article IV, section 6 can require Senate confirmation or the approval of three cabinet members to appoint or remove its holder. Florida boards that grant and revoke licenses for regulated occupations must sit inside the appropriate department, with members appointed for fixed terms and removable only for cause (Article IV, section 6).

The governor may also suspend, by an executive order stating the grounds and filed with the custodian of state records, any state officer not subject to impeachment and any county officer, and fill the office by appointment during the suspension. The Florida Senate then decides, in proceedings set by law, whether to remove or reinstate the official, and may be called into special session for that purpose by its president or a majority of its members (Article IV, section 7).

Florida's judicial branch is the supreme court, the district courts of appeal, the circuit courts and the county courts, and Article V forbids the state or any city or county from creating any other court (Article V, section 1).

The supreme court has seven justices, and each appellate district must have at least one justice who lived in that district when first chosen. The Legislature, not the courts, draws the appellate districts and judicial circuits, which must follow Florida county lines (Article V, sections 1 and 3).

Article V also provides for two Florida offices elected in each judicial circuit, the state attorney and the public defender, each for a term of four years. Their budgets and those of the courts come out of state revenues, and Article V denies the judges any power to set appropriations themselves (Article V, sections 14, 17 and 18).

The governor, lieutenant governor and cabinet are elected together for four-year terms at the general election in each even-numbered year that is not a multiple of four (Article IV, section 5).

The Division of Elections lists November 3, 2026 as the 2026 general election day (Division of Elections, election dates).

On the November ballot the top two Florida executive offices appear as a pair, with one vote covering both, and the winners start in January. When elected, the governor, lieutenant governor and each cabinet member must be an elector at least thirty years old who has lived in Florida for the preceding seven years. The governor's own limit is framed differently from the others: anyone who has held the office, acting or elected, for over six years across two consecutive terms cannot be elected to the following term (Article IV, section 5).

A Florida House member, senator, lieutenant governor or cabinet officer who would reach that mark in the same office by the end of the current term cannot be listed on the ballot to seek it again, under Article VI, section 4 (Article VI, section 4).

The Division of Elections describes the cycle in plain terms: a general election falls on the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November of every even-numbered year, and a governor is elected every four years at one of them (Florida Division of Elections).

Last verified: October 18, 2026, against Articles II through VI of the Florida Constitution as posted by the Florida Senate, the Senate's current member roster, the Department of State quick facts and 2026 election calendar, and the Executive Office of the Governor home page.