, Columnist
The Young Founded the U.S. The Old Took It Over.
Most of the Founders were in their 30s and 40s, while the crowd in charge today is in their 50s, 60s and 70s.Â
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Todd Andrlik's postthis week in Slate on the ages of the leaders of the American Revolution was a delightful eye-opener. They were so young! Or at least many of them were. Thomas Jefferson was 33 on July 4, 1776. James Madison, 25. Alexander Hamilton, 21 (as best anyone can determine). Patrick Henry and John Adams, both 40. Paul Revere, a grizzled 41, though not quite as grizzled as that 70-year-old Ben Franklin.
The average age of the signers of the Declaration of Independence? Forty-four, and more than a dozen of them hadn't reached 36. Maybe the American obsession with youth started with the nation's birth.