Our presidential candidates have never been older. You can thank the Founding Fathers

Age was but a number at the Constitutional Convention
The 1787 Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia was full of intense debates that shaped the Constitution and are memorable even now. It's easy to assume that the age requirement was similarly the product of a lot of time and deliberation. But that wasn't necessarily the case. After all, the Founders were busy constructing an entire government from scratch, says Julian Davis Mortenson, a constitutional law professor at the University of Michigan.