Why do you think the Constitution did not include other qualifications for members of Congress?

The constitutional requirements for members of Congress are:

• Senators must be 30 years old, have been a citizen of the United States for nine years, and a resident of the state which they represent.


• Representatives must be 25 years old, have been citizens for seven years, and be residents of the state which they represent.

These requirements are fairly loose, and opened membership in Congress to most American citizens. There was considerable debate at the...

The constitutional requirements for members of Congress are:

• Senators must be 30 years old, have been a citizen of the United States for nine years, and a resident of the state which they represent.


• Representatives must be 25 years old, have been citizens for seven years, and be residents of the state which they represent.

These requirements are fairly loose, and opened membership in Congress to most American citizens. There was considerable debate at the Philadelphia Convention about additional requirements. Some delegates thought a property requirement was needed, but this requirement was voted down. Religious tests, required by law in Great Britain for membership in Parliament, were specifically banned by the Constitution. Others thought naturalized citizens should be ineligible for election in at least the Senate. Generally, the reasons for these omissions were that most of the delegates feared what James Madison called an "aristocracy or an oligarchy." None of the Framers of the Constitution were democrats, but they did not want the Congress to be dominated by one particular "interest" or faction. They also assumed that the states, to which were delegated many of the decisions about electing officeholders, would "filter out" undesirable candidates through their own requirements for candidates. For example, there was never even any discussion of allowing women to serve as Congressmen at the Convention. So generally, they saw additional requirements for members of Congress to be unnecessary or undesirable.