Biden’s run just the same old story

United States President Joe Biden’s determination to seek a further four-year term when he is already in his 80s has raised the question of whether there is ever a time when men and women are too old to hold public office.

Biden’s political opponents have made his age an issue, and while he may be the oldest Chief Executive, there are plenty of examples of politicians who have held high office and been very active in it through their 70s, 80s and even 90s. 

While most Presidents who end their terms seek a comfortable retirement building their libraries and burnishing their legacies, John Quincy Adams was a notable exception.

After losing his re-election bid in 1829, the sixth President entered the House of Representatives, where he served for almost another 17 years before suffering a fatal stroke while answering a question in the House Chamber.

By then Adams was 80 at a time when the average male life expectancy was less than half that. He would not have known it, but he was setting an example that lawmakers, both in the US and overseas, would follow into the 20^th and 21^st centuries.

Currently there are members of both main parties in the US Congress in their 70s and 80s, with two members of the Senate on the verge of their 90s. Even that pales beside the record of James Strom Thurmond (pictured), elected to the Senate in 1954 and retiring 48 years later at the ripe old age of 100. 

Elsewhere, the case of the United Kingdom’s wartime Prime Minister, Winston Churchill stands out. First elected to Parliament in 1900, he was in his mid-60s when he took on the role of successfully leading his nation through the conflict with Nazi Germany.

After failing to win the General Election of 1945, he stayed on to lead his Conservative Party to victory in 1951, serving as Prime Minister again until 1955 when he was approaching 81.

However, the UK record belongs to Samuel Young, who was elected to the Irish seat of East Cavan when he was 70 and held it until his death in 1918 at the age of 96 years and 63 days.

In Australia longevity in office is a rarity, with many MPs and Ministers almost seeing service in the House of Representatives and the Senate as a rite of passage before moving on to other areas.

William Morris (Billy) Hughes was an exception. The English migrant was a member of the inaugural Federal Parliament in 1901, became the country’s seventh Prime Minister in 1915 in the midst of World War I, serving until he was forced out in 1923.

His appetite for the machinations of politics undimmed, he continued to be highly active through the 1930s and 40s, before his death, while still a Member of the House of Representatives in 1952 at the age of 90 years and one month.

Some countries have mulled the possibility of imposing upper age limits on their lawmakers. In 2015, a French Government announcement that it was considering barring anyone over 70 from standing for election or re-election, met with a storm of criticism, mostly from those in the upper age range who, by virtue of their seniority, held influential positions in Parliament. The proposal was quietly shelved.

While there have been many examples of politicians serving into old age, there can surely be only one holder of the record for the youngest member of an elected Parliament.

Christopher Monck was just 13 when he entered England’s House of Commons as the MP for Devon in 1667, where he sat for three years before being elevated to the House of Lords on the death of his father.

It was not until 1695 that the Parliamentary Elections Act established 21 as the minimum age for MPs.