TL;DR
Our Founding Fathers were shockingly young: Jefferson was 33 when he wrote the Declaration, while Hamilton was just 21.
Somewhere along the way, we started assigning “experience and qualifications” based on age, yet this Congress – arguably not doing the best job – is one of the oldest in U.S. history.
Increasing age diversity in politics can change the current attitude of the 70% of Americans who are dissatisfied with our government.
You don’t need gray hair or a law degree to run for office, and local offices are a great place to start. Check out our free course, So You Think You Want To Run?
Hi! I’m Delara, an NDTC intern here!
For most of my life, I’ve assumed that running for office was something you do later in life. After you get a political science degree, go to law school, grind through a career for a while, and finally have enough gray hair that people assume you know what you were talking about. That was what I envisioned a “politician” looked like. A politician, to me, meant power and cameras everywhere, far from what I assumed would ever be in my reach or age range.
But one night I was scrolling on Instagram, as you do at 9 pm, and I landed on a carousel about how young our Founding Fathers in 1776 actually were. As I swiped through, I was astonished to see that these were young adults not that much older than me.
Thomas Jefferson was 33 and considered young for leadership when he wrote the Declaration of Independence. Alexander Hamilton was around 30 when he helped shape the Constitution just over a decade later. Thirty-three. Thirty. But they drafted the documents to found a country. Turns out the white wigs deceived me. Turns out I pictured the founders the exact same way I pictured politicians in general: older, wiser, more experienced, and thus more “qualified” for the power they reached.
This got me thinking: The 119th Congress is the third oldest in U.S. history. And somewhere along the way, we started assigning “experience and qualifications” based on age, to the point where it altered our perception of our founders. But if some of them were in their late 20s and 30s doing the most important political work of their lives, then many of our assumptions are wrong. Which means we don’t have to be a certain age to be political either.
When 70% of Americans are dissatisfied with our government, it’s well past time to reexamine our assumptions. And the moment to aim for diversity has never been more important. Increasing the age ranges of our representatives would certainly change the status quo. And Millennials and Gen Z-ers have already accumulated some real-world wisdom and political cache of our own. Together, they already represent more than half of NDTC’s learners.
I’m thinking of the college kid who did virtual school through COVID and is now a young nurse who would develop thoughtful healthcare policy. The millennial that just moved out of their family home and would champion rent control or builder incentives for more apartments. The laid-off economic journalist turned content creator who could usher in support for a new-er deal. Aren’t these lived experiences the qualifications to deal with the very problems we’re now left with?
While running for office may seem way beyond one’s reach or imply a constitutional age requirement, local office is a lot more accessible, faster to implement change, and doesn’t come with an age barrier. And it’s definitely less intimidating than writing the fate of our nation in Independence Hall, Philadelphia.
It might also be a lot closer to home than you think. Mine certainly was.
Confession Time
So I have something embarrassing to admit…
I did not realize that my own father was on our local school board for basically my entire early childhood from elementary school through middle school. And even being actively involved in politics from a young age, it still didn’t click for me until much later that what he was doing was holding elected office. At the time, I thought of "elected office" as a job in DC with a television and a podium.
But a school board seat is an elected office. So is a city council seat, a county commission seat, a water board seat, a precinct captain role. They’re all key roles in which we experience daily democracy at the grassroots level. And they don’t require a law degree, three decades of experience, a single gray hair, or a white powdered wig.
They require someone who shows up, the same way a 33-year-old wrote the Declaration of Independence and a 30-year-old helped shape the Constitution, because nobody told them they had to wait to get older.
If any part of you has ever wondered what it would actually take to run, check out our free course So You Think You Want To Run? No age minimums or gray hair required.
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