# Where does 21 as a legal age come from? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [February 18, 2007, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-does-21-as-a-legal-age-come-from/392710 "2007-02-18T15:45:13Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2007, 1:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-does-21-as-a-legal-age-come-from/392710/21 "2007-02-19T01:11:37Z")
As Mason once said to Dixon, “You’ve got to draw the line somewhere.” ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2007, 1:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-does-21-as-a-legal-age-come-from/392710/22 "2007-02-19T01:16:16Z")
Out of curiousity, are there areas that have the equivalent of learner’s permits for drinking? As far as I know, there’s a cut-off - before a certain age you cannot drink at all and after that age you can drink whatever, wherever, and as much as you want. Has any state ever experimented with graduated drinking ages - for example, allowing home consumption of beer or wine at 18, public consumption at 20, and the drinking of distilled liquors at 21? ---
**Author:** ![alphaboi867](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alphaboi867/32/3898_2.png) [@alphaboi867](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alphaboi867)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2007, 1:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-does-21-as-a-legal-age-come-from/392710/23 "2007-02-19T01:32:40Z")
[QUOTE=Little Nemo] Out of curiousity, are there areas that have the equivalent of learner’s permits for drinking? As far as I know, there’s a cut-off - before a certain age you cannot drink at all and after that age you can drink whatever, wherever, and as much as you want. Has any state ever experimented with graduated drinking ages - for example, allowing home consumption of beer or wine at 18, public consumption at 20, and the drinking of distilled liquors at 21? [/QUOTE] Yes, I have an old layman’s guide to law book from circa 1970. It lists alls sorts of state by state charts for things like drinking, voting, marriage, etc. Sadly it’s in storage and I don’t remember specifics off-hand (other than Georgia started letting 18 yrs vote during WWII). Some states did have different ages for beer/wine/spirits and if I remember correctly at least one had different drinking ages for men and women (& it was lower for women). ---
**Author:** ![kellner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c2a13f/32.png) [@kellner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kellner)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2007, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-does-21-as-a-legal-age-come-from/392710/24 "2007-02-19T01:39:09Z")
[QUOTE=Little Nemo] Out of curiousity, are there areas that have the equivalent of learner’s permits for drinking? As far as I know, there’s a cut-off - before a certain age you cannot drink at all and after that age you can drink whatever, wherever, and as much as you want. Has any state ever experimented with graduated drinking ages - for example, allowing home consumption of beer or wine at 18, public consumption at 20, and the drinking of distilled liquors at 21? [/QUOTE] Ok, it’s not a US state, but we have that. Parents can give their children alcohol at any age. At 16 you can drink beer, wine and everything else that isn’t distilled (or contains a non-trivial amount of distilled alcohol) on your own. At 18 you can drink everything else. ---
**Author:** ![5\_time\_champ](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/5/278dde/32.png) [@5\_time\_champ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/5_time_champ)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2007, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-does-21-as-a-legal-age-come-from/392710/25 "2007-02-19T01:52:38Z")
[QUOTE=Exapno Mapcase] No. On your first birthday, you have completed your first year and started the first day of your second year On your twentieth birthday, you have completed your twentieth year and started the first day of your twenty-first year. On your twenty-first birthday, you have completed your twenty-first year and started the first day of your twenty-second year. This is the sort of crap we get from people who think that the millennium started in the year 2000 instead of 2001. [/QUOTE] :smack: You are quite right. I am well aware the Third Millennium began 1/1/2001. IIRC I wrote a letter to the editor chiding the St Louis Post-Dispatch in 1997 regarding the correct first day of the upcoming new millennium. Not sure where my reasoning got off-track, as a check I went through in my mind the whole “baby’s first year is from birth to first birthday” and “the 19th Century is the 1800s” reasonings. Oh well, :o Upon Further Review, twenty-one is three equal periods of seven years: Seven being the age of reason- knowing right from wrong; then add another 7 years and you get Fourteen, being the age of consent [around the onset of puberty in earlier times]; then add another 7 years and you get Twenty-one-- the age of majority. ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2007, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-does-21-as-a-legal-age-come-from/392710/26 "2007-02-19T02:00:37Z")
[QUOTE=Little Nemo] Out of curiousity, are there areas that have the equivalent of learner’s permits for drinking? As far as I know, there’s a cut-off - before a certain age you cannot drink at all and after that age you can drink whatever, wherever, and as much as you want. Has any state ever experimented with graduated drinking ages - for example, allowing home consumption of beer or wine at 18, public consumption at 20, and the drinking of distilled liquors at 21? [/QUOTE] It’s the case in many states that a parent can purchase and serve alchohol to their child. Some places it’s only legal at home, and others the parent can buy for the child in a bar. We had a thread on it a while back, but I’m not having any Search luck right now. ---
**Author:** ![sdguy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8dc957/32.png) [@sdguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sdguy)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2007, 4:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-does-21-as-a-legal-age-come-from/392710/27 "2007-02-19T04:16:38Z")
In some places the age of majority used to be different for the sexes age 18 for female and age 21 for male. The 26th amendment from what I can remember reading was a reaction to the Vietnam area when the federal government came to agree people ought to have a voice IF they are being sent to die. So the federal government said anyone 18 or older could vote in FEDERAL elections. Most of the states didn’t want the hassle of having two election rolls, one for those 18-20 who could only vote for federal and one for those over 21 who could vote for everyone, so the 26th amendment giving everyone the vote 18+ was cheaper and easier. Indeed I believe it was the quickest amendment passed. Most states also lowered their drinking age below 21 after the 26th amendment passed. When they saw it became a problem the upped the age again. Some like Wiscosin, had more trouble with the under 21 set from Illinois crossing over and drinking, than they did with their own under 21 population. ---
**Author:** ![Sleel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/73ab20/32.png) [@Sleel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sleel)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2007, 4:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-does-21-as-a-legal-age-come-from/392710/28 "2007-02-19T04:54:36Z")
The historical age of majority in Colonial America was 21 for men. The revision to 18 was very recent. The historical reason for that age goes back to British common law, unless I’m mistaken, which would have its roots in traditions that are 800–1000 years old. You could probably trace it back farther, to Chivalric traditions, but I think 800+ yeas of tradition is enough to explain the modern usage of that age. I remember reading that there was some debate about suffrage among the founding fathers. Some wanted the age of majority to be older (25) and have a requirement of being a landowner in order to vote. The reasoning was that landowning meant that you had a vested interest in the well-being of the country, and the greater age along with the seasoning of holding property would mean that those making the decisions were more likely to be responsible. Advocates of tradition won out over those wanting reform, so the age of majority remained at the historical age of twenty-one. The requirement to own land stood though, and in fact “universal” suffrage (if you were a white male) didn’t go through until [1870](http://regentsprep.org/regents/ushisgov/themes/reform/suffrage.htm). ---
**Author:** ![Critical1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/3e96dc/32.png) [@Critical1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Critical1)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2007, 4:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-does-21-as-a-legal-age-come-from/392710/29 "2007-02-19T04:59:48Z")
I heard the 21 rule had to do with the male. specifically the liver doesnt reach full development until then. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2007, 10:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-does-21-as-a-legal-age-come-from/392710/30 "2007-02-19T10:06:34Z")
[QUOTE=Polycarp] **Exapno** nails it: it’s a common age for official majority because historically it _has been_ a common age, particularly in legal contexts where precedent can be traced. One WAG that seems to have some validity behind it is the _cursus honorum_ of boys from the aristocracy back in feudal societies: at age 7, you became a page, running errands for the king/duke/count/squire; after 7 years, at age 14, you became an esquire, “apprenticing” to a knight to learn the arts of war and the courtesies expected from you as a gentleman; after another 7 years, you were eligible to be dubbed a knight – at age 21. [/QUOTE] Where? In Spain it was not unusual to be a knight at 16. You had to have been trained and you had to be able to pay for your own horse and squire. If you got to 20 and hadn’t made it, you probably were not going to ever make it. ---
**Author:** ![naita](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/naita/32/5862_2.png) [@naita](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/naita)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2007, 10:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-does-21-as-a-legal-age-come-from/392710/31 "2007-02-19T10:32:25Z")
Norweigan historical majority ages for comparison purposes: [Magnus Law-mender’s](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnus_VI_of_Norway) unified Norwegian laws of 1274 set the age limit for participation in regional parliament to 20. In 1619 the age of majority was raised to 25. In 1869 it was lowered to 21, 100 years later down to 20, and then to 18 in 1979. ---
**Author:** ![StuffLikeThatThere](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bc8723/32.png) [@StuffLikeThatThere](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/StuffLikeThatThere)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2007, 2:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-does-21-as-a-legal-age-come-from/392710/32 "2007-02-19T14:02:45Z")
[QUOTE=Little Nemo] Out of curiousity, are there areas that have the equivalent of learner’s permits for drinking? As far as I know, there’s a cut-off - before a certain age you cannot drink at all and after that age you can drink whatever, wherever, and as much as you want. Has any state ever experimented with graduated drinking ages - for example, allowing home consumption of beer or wine at 18, public consumption at 20, and the drinking of distilled liquors at 21? [/QUOTE] There used to be something along that line in Ohio. At 18, you could purchase and drink “low beer” legally, which was beer with alcohol content below a certain percentage. (Sorry, I don’t recall the percentage.) Hard liquor and other things were not legal for purchase until 21. My siblings turned 18 under this rule, and I, the tacked-on baby, did so under the 21 for all alcohol rule. So it changed sometime in the late 80s or early 90s. I’ve never heard it referred to as a drinker’s learning permit, though, and the concept tickles me. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Nuggets](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a87d85/32.png) [@Mr.Nuggets](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Nuggets)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2007, 3:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-does-21-as-a-legal-age-come-from/392710/33 "2007-02-19T15:11:15Z")
It’s because in 13th century England, people were knighted at 21. ---
**Author:** ![Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a587f6/32.png) [@Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freddy_the_Pig)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2007, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-does-21-as-a-legal-age-come-from/392710/34 "2007-02-19T15:23:09Z")
[QUOTE=Sleel] I remember reading that there was some debate about suffrage among the founding fathers. [/quote] There was very little debate at the federal Constitutional Convention, because there was a consensus that suffrage requirements should be left to the states. > [@Sleel](#): > > Some wanted the age of majority to be older (25) and have a requirement of being a landowner in order to vote. The reasoning was that landowning meant that you had a vested interest in the well-being of the country, and the greater age along with the seasoning of holding property would mean that those making the decisions were more likely to be responsible. Most states did indeed have a land-owning requirement during the early republic. These were gradually repealed, on a state-by-state basis, during the early Nineteenth Century. I’m not aware of any debate at the state level over raising the age of suffrage to 25, nor of any state actually doing so. Georgia was the first state to lower its voting age to 18, during World War II. > [@Sleel](#): > > The requirement to own land stood though, and in fact “universal” suffrage (if you were a white male) didn’t go through until [1870](http://regentsprep.org/regents/ushisgov/themes/reform/suffrage.htm). The “Regents Prep” link is wrong, so the regents aren’t “prepping” anyone very well. The Fifteenth Amendment (1870) didn’t require “universal male suffrage”; it merely forbade states from discriminating on grounds of race, color, or previous condition of servitude. As I say, most (if not all) states had already repealed property qualifications by this time, but some New England states imposed _literacy tests_ to make it more difficult for immigrants to vote, and in the ensuing decades Southern states did so to make it more difficult for African Americans and poor whites to vote. > [@sdguy](#): > > The 26th amendment from what I can remember reading was a reaction to the Vietnam area when the federal government came to agree people ought to have a voice IF they are being sent to die. So the federal government said anyone 18 or older could vote in FEDERAL elections. > > Most of the states didn’t want the hassle of having two election rolls, one for those 18-20 who could only vote for federal and one for those over 21 who could vote for everyone, so the 26th amendment giving everyone the vote 18+ was cheaper and easier. In 1970, the federal government attempted to enfracnhise 18-year-olds in federal elections _by statute_. This would have required states which maintained a higher voting age to maintain dual rolls. However, the law was struck down as unconstitutional in _Oregon v. Mitchell_. At about the same time, Congress sent the proposed Twenty-Sixth Amendment to the states, which enfranchised 18-year-olds in _all_ elections, federal and state. This was duly ratified in 1971 and created no dual-voter-roll problems. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2007, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-does-21-as-a-legal-age-come-from/392710/35 "2007-02-19T16:43:52Z")
[QUOTE=Mr. Nuggets] It’s because in 13th century England, people were knighted at 21. [/QUOTE] I hate to do this to a guest, but… Cite? ---
**Author:** ![groman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/73ab20/32.png) [@groman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/groman)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2007, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-does-21-as-a-legal-age-come-from/392710/36 "2007-02-19T19:13:57Z")
[QUOTE=Critical1] I heard the 21 rule had to do with the male. specifically the liver doesnt reach full development until then. [/QUOTE] That really sounds like it’s… well crap. Even if the average age the liver was fully mature was 21 (which is fairly late I’d think), this would not have been known when the laws were passed nor is that a reasonable thing to pass a law on. Just like age of consent laws have very little to do with age of puberty. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2007, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-does-21-as-a-legal-age-come-from/392710/37 "2007-02-20T17:32:01Z")
[QUOTE=Polycarp] The thing is, 21 as the age of legal majority well predates the “finish high school and then four years of college” or even the “attend high school until graduate/turn 18” concepts. We’ve addressed some of the near-past reasons for _keeping_ it at 21, but none of this (except unsubstantiated stuff from **Exapno** and myself) suggests why it was set at 21 in the first place. Any medieval historians or students of the history of law around who can shed any light on that? [/QUOTE] According to [Blackstone](http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/blackstone/bk1ch17.htm) , it’s an arbitary age that varied from country to country. There’s a general consensus in western societies that young people are not fully capable and need to be under the tutelage of a parent or other adult until a certain point. There’s usually a graduated approach, with a young person in their teens gradually gaining more legal rights, until a time finally comes when the young person is considered a full adult. The exact age at which that transition to full adulthood occurs varies from society to society: > [@Blackstone's Commentaries on the Laws of England - Of Guardian and Ward](#): > > 1. LET us next consider the ward, or person within age, for whose assistance and support these guardians are constituted by law ; or who it is, that is said to be within age. The ages of male and female are different for different purposes. A male at twelve years old may take the oath of allegiance ; at fourteen is at years old may take the oath of allegiance ; at fourteen is at years of discretion, and therefore may consent or disagree to marriage, may choose his guardian, and, if his discretion be actually proved, may make his testament of his personal estate ; at seventeen may be an executor ; and **at twenty one is at his own disposal, and may aliene his lands, goods, and chattels.** A female also at seven years of age may be betrothed or given in marriage ; at nine is entitled to dower ; at twelve is at years of maturity, and therefore may consent or disagree to marriage, and, if proved to have sufficient discretion, may bequeath her personal estate ; at fourteen is at years of legal discretion, and may choose a guardian ; at seventeen may be executrix ; **and at twenty one may dispose of herself and her lands.** **So that full age in male or female, is twenty one years, which age is completed on the day preceding the anniversary of a person’s birth; who till that time is an infant, and so stiled in law.** Among the antient Greeks and Romans women were never of age, but subject to perpetual guardianship, unless when married, “nisi convenissent in manum viri:” and, when that perpetual tutelage wore away in process of time, we find that, in females as well as males, full age was not till twenty five years. Thus, **by the constitutions of different kingdoms, this period, which is merely arbitrary, and juris positivi, is fixed at different times. Scotland agrees with England in this point** ; (both probably copying from the old Saxon constitutions on the continent, which extended the age of minority “ad annum vigesimum primum’, “et eo usque juvenes sub tutelam reponunt”) but in Naples they are of full age at eighteen ; in France, with regard to marriage, not till thirty ; and in Holland at twenty five. So he speculates that the age of 21 dates back to the ancient Saxons. Note as well that in this graduated system, the most important thing that marked full age was the ability to dispose of one’s lands. Political decisions (like swearing allegiance) and personal decisons (like marriage), or minor economic decisions (like the ability to dispose of personal property), were not nearly as important as the ability to alienate land. Land was the single most important form of property in a feudal/agrarian society, so the power to alienate land was the marker of full age. Nothing to do with schooling, drinking ages, or the maturity of the liver. Or, to summarise, what **Little Nemo** said. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2007, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-does-21-as-a-legal-age-come-from/392710/38 "2007-02-20T17:39:46Z")
[QUOTE=Exapno Mapcase] It’s a leftover from British common law [/QUOTE] > [@sleel](#): > > The historical reason for that age goes back to British common law Minor nitpcik: there’s no such thing as “British common law.” The common law evolved in England and was applied to Wales and Ireland, but Scotland had its own legal system, based on a combination of Scots feudal law and the Roman civil law. ---
**Author:** ![psycat90](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/7ea924/32.png) [@psycat90](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psycat90)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2007, 6:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-does-21-as-a-legal-age-come-from/392710/39 "2007-02-20T18:06:08Z")
[QUOTE=WhyNot] It’s the case in many states that a parent can purchase and serve alchohol to their child. Some places it’s only legal at home, and others the parent can buy for the child in a bar. We had a thread on it a while back, but I’m not having any Search luck right now. [/QUOTE] This is true in California per [this site.](http://www.fightunderagedrinking.org/state_prof/California.pdf) (pdf) I’ve never personally had a problem with pouring my (almost 20 year old) son a glass or two of wine while dining out. I’ve never had a problem with pouring a glass for my almost 16 year old son either, but apparently I was breaking the law by doing so according to that site. Looks like 18 or over is the ‘interim’ age. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-does-21-as-a-legal-age-come-from/392710.md?page=1)