As the 2024 election approaches, the election follows a recent pattern of older candidates campaigning and being elected into office. Despite his withdrawal, President Joe Biden was the oldest so far at 81 years old and former president Donald Trump trailing suit at 78, just a year older than third place with Ronald Reagan at age 77 when he left office.
This isn’t a trend limited to the presidency, as the average age in the legislative and judicial branches has never been higher. Whilst the median age in America was 38.9 years old in 2022, the average House member is 57.9 years old and the average Senator is 65.3 for the presiding 118th Congress. Due to this, some have begun to question the finite ability of the US’ most powerful people to accurately reflect the modern day values of the typical American.
The origins of age restrictions, or lack thereof, lie in the cultural expectations of the time when the Founding Fathers wrote the first rendition of the Constitution in 1787. As documented, the Founding Fathers debated whether to include age or term limits for any of the positions as seen with the Articles of Confederation. However, they ultimately reversed this decision since all the initial politicians elected were farmers, blacksmiths, shoemakers, etc.
Their assumption was that democratic principles would dictate the length people served before returning to their previous jobs, with George Washington establishing two terms at the convention. Decades later, people began to run for office with the objective of staying as long as they could – a goal that would go on to epitomize the true intentions of most politicians today. Term limits for the president wouldn’t be constitutionalized until after President Franklin D. Roosevelt held office for four. The introduction of the 22nd Amendment determined two terms to be the limit.
Now, in the modern age, we still don’t have age restrictions for Congress members, the President, or Supreme Court Justices. Some have begun to question the incongruities between representatives and their constituents due to 88% of the House and 97% of the Senate being Gen X or older, the youngest members of which are 43 years old. Similarly, the youngest Supreme Court Justice, Amy Coney Barrett, is 52. Let’s remember now that the average age in America is 38.9 years old.
As previously mentioned, miscommunications about Americans’ beliefs and what representatives vote for are numerous. A 2024 collaboration conducted between UPenn, Dartmouth, and Stanford tested the extent of this tendency through a survey about support and opposition to democratic norms. The study revealed the vast majority of Americans dispute these violations with only 17.2% of Democrats and 21.6% of Republicans supporting the infringement of one and both parties denouncing the use of violence to enforce such at 4%. When compared to the percentage of elected officials who either voted to overturn the 2020 election or publicly denied its legitimacy, they found an almost majority of elected Republicans indicating they would vote in favor of party loyalty over the Constitutional standards. This is a common tactic for politicians to conserve their positions.
This can be attributed to the difficulty of changing one’s beliefs and brain shortcuts for how we anticipate things to be related as a means to navigate complex ideas and interpret how we feel. In addition, brains try to maintain a state of equilibrium and stability not only for physical processes, but also cognitive ones, which beliefs help preserve. People explain contradictions to their beliefs through distorted rationalizations to make their worldview consistent.
This translates to politics with how partisan bias is little reduced amongst high-information voters because of people’s tendencies to only accept facts if they align with their previously-held conceptions: A phenomenon known as political dissonance. Not to mention, belief systems often become intertwined with our self-concepts. People like politicians risk their reputations and careers to uphold their beliefs, leading to only gradual change in the political landscape.
A disconnection is thus created from the substantial differences in values prevalent between older representatives and their younger constituents. Lots of older people can’t holistically comprehend the threat of depleting social security, the oversaturated job market, and the new struggles of trying to afford a house for many Gen Z members. Most of their policies enacted now are reactionary– they consider only the present and don’t create preventative measures that will ensure a brighter future.
Yet, the fact that one needs money, experience, and connections for campaigns provides incumbents with significant advantages. Experience and expertise have become synonymous for some, resulting in the popular pipeline of Vice Presidents becoming Presidents, as is the case with Joe Biden. Despite this equation of experience to expertise, the latter customarily indicates proficiency in contemporary discoveries and affairs more so than an overall accumulation of years in a field. This is not helped by how the two-party system in America is perpetuated by the mentality of voting for one of the main party candidates because you don’t want the other to win.
As stated above, the Founding Fathers expected democratic norms to influence the length one person would serve in office, one of which was faith in checks and balances. Today, the popularization of career politicians has decreased the efficacy of frequent reappointments in Congress and the Supreme Court. Not to mention, the inevitable hindrance the lack of age and term limitations have brought across the government because of how the probability of chronic health conditions increases exponentially in adults 60 and older.
According to the National Council on Aging, 95% of people 60 and older have at least one chronic condition with 80% having two or more. From 82-year-old senator Mitch McConnell’s various freezings and the late Senator Dianne Feinstein at 90 stumbling over her words, we can see cognitive function also becomes quite impaired with age. These occurrences should warrant cognitive assessments for other government representatives similar to the ones performed on Presidents. Despite their status and apparent opposition, it’s recommended by most physicians for older people to receive them as to give an early diagnosis for neurodegenerative diseases.
It’s time for government officials to recognize their inability to (1) meet the mental demands of their jobs and (2) properly relate to the modern hardships of the vast American population. A sentiment shared by 79% of the American public in relation to elected officials and 74% in relation to the Supreme Justices, as noted by a 2023 Pew Research Study. If not, statutes won’t be passed in order to implement these restrictions, therefore risking the diminishment of young people’s interest in democracy because of how few young people get elected.