It's Not Sexist to Ask an 89-Year-Old Who Isn't Showing Up to Work to Consider Retirement

Last summer, we floated an upper age limit to serve in American public office to match the minimum we've all accepted since the founding. 80 years old was the milestone we mooted for when a politician should be encouraged to go spend more time with the grandkids, but it was more of a curtain-raiser for these discussions than a hard policy demand. (It was never likely that politicians would vote to impose a rule on themselves.) One reason we should be wary of electing officeholders of advanced age is that elderly people can decline quite suddenly, at which point they could be unable to fulfill their duties and serve the public. This appears to be the case with California Senator Dianne Feinstein, 89, who has not shown up to the Senate chamber since February. She is suffering with a case of shingles and has said she's working from home, though there have been reports for years that her cognitive health is in significant decline.

Related Story The Case for Age Limits in American Politics

Feinstein is not alone in her absence this year—Senator John Fetterman, another Democrat, returned to the Senate on Monday following six weeks of treatment for depression. But hers is particularly pressing as a member of the slim Democratic majority on the Senate Judiciary Committee. Her absence has imperiled President Joe Biden's push to populate the Judicial Branch with judges who reflect the party's values and priorities, and just in the last couple of weeks we've seen that this is possibly the most important agenda item—for both the White House and the Democratic Senate—in a split Congress where not much else may get done. A federal judge in Texas nominated by President Donald Trump, Matthew Kacsmaryk, took it upon himself to nix a decision from the Food and Drug Administration back in 2000 that approved the use of mifepristone, one of the drugs used in medication abortion. American women's right to make a decision about their own body is now in limbo, batted about by various judges across the land.

Mitch McConnell, who was just absent himself for 40 days following a head injury, has repeatedly demonstrated that Republicans will be ruthless in their attempts to secure judges who will advance conservative priorities. Anna Moneymaker // Getty Images

Republicans have lost enough elections that their main route to making conservative policy now runs through activist judges they set about installing over the last decade and change. It began with Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell's scorched-earth assault on then-President Obama's constitutional prerogative to appoint judges, slowing the process to a halt at every level of the federal system until the opportunity arose for a shameless coup de grace: making up a fanciful rule that presidents can't nominate a Supreme Court justice in an election year. McConnell left the departed Antonin Scalia's seat open, denying Obama pick Merrick Garland any kind of consideration, until it could be filled by Donald Trump. Fast forward a few years, and the man who did get the seat, Justice Neil Gorsuch, was voting to nix Roe v. Wade and—considering many red states had "trigger laws" set to go into effect on such a ruling—de facto strip millions of American women of their abortion rights.

It should be no surprise, then, that Republicans in the Senate blockaded an attempt from Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer on Monday to temporarily replace Feinstein on the Judiciary Committee so that it could resume the work of getting Biden's judges approved. This was per Feinstein's request, and it is not one that screams "feasible!" here in our unfortunate reality. They're rolling out chin-stroking concerns about how Democrats are trying to run Feinstein out of town, as if she is currently in town, when we all know they want to keep as many judicial vacancies open as they can until another Republican wins a presidential election (if not, perhaps, the popular vote).

"I will not go along with Chuck Schumer’s plan to replace Senator Feinstein on the Judiciary Committee and pack the court with activist judges," tweeted Tennessee Senator Marsha Blackburn. Is the implication that Feinstein was not voting for Biden's picks? Don't think about it too hard. The point is that they don't want Biden appointing judges. Susan Collins of Maine, meanwhile, rolled out the concern-trolling: "Dianne has been a trailblazing senator…During the past two years, it has become crystal clear that there has been a concerted campaign to force her off the Judiciary Committee, and I will have no part in it."

Maybe Collins is genuinely concerned, but she can also be found—without fail!—advancing the priorities of the Republican caucus as determined by Mitch McConnell. What was stranger to see was the statement from Rep. Nancy Pelosi, the former Speaker of the House, on Friday:

Let us be the first to point out that, in that age limits column last summer, I focused just as much or more on Senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa. He was subsequently reelected in November, meaning he will be 95 at the end of his current term.

Feinstein is absolutely a trailblazing figure who has made her mark in American history, particularly on behalf of American women. But it is not sexist, as Pelosi implies, to say that an 89-year-old who can't show up to work should consider retirement. Everybody has their time, and the ephemeral nature of our existence is painful, but everybody's time comes to an end. Achieving icon status is not a blanket invitation to serve in public office forever, particularly because, lest we forget, you are charged with making the laws we all have to live by. We did not elect your aides and staffers.

And while Feinstein has contributed so much in her years in public service, this ultimately is not about her. Consider the case of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, another trailblazing woman in American public life who chose not to retire at a time when she could have been replaced by a president who shared her values a bit more than Donald Trump. Ginsburg was the essential feminist icon for many Americans, a true giant, and yet in the end, she was replaced by Amy Coney Barrett eight days before the 2020 presidential election—the ultimate proof that McConnell was willing to lie, cheat, and steal to secure any seat on the high court. It was no simple thing to ask her to give up a position she'd worked all her life to earn, that had become intertwined with her identity. But for all Ginsburg had accomplished, Roe died less than two years after she did. Barrett joined the aforementioned Gorsuch, along with crowd favorite Brett Kavanaugh, to remove all doubt about which way the case would go long before the decision came down.

All this is to say that if it's really about the country and its people, not your own vanity, then being asked to step down is not some affront to your legacy or all you've achieved. It's not supposed to be about you, however much inspiring you've done. Take a page from Obama's book of metaphors, where public service is like running one leg of a relay race. At some point, you've got to pass the baton, preferably before you fall down on the track. Failing that, take the lesson Obama failed to: the Republicans will scorch the earth at your feet if it means a few more judges advancing conservative policy from the bench. They tend to pick ideologues young enough to reverse your accomplishments for decades. If not for the people, then, do it for yourself.