How old should the Supreme Court be?

I made a parenthetic comment in an earlier post that mainstream discussions, such as those that take place around Supreme Court nominations, consistently neglect the insight that people change qualitatively over the course of their lives.  This blog post describes how that process has turned Associate Justice John Paul Stevens into a fine justice.  Which got me to thinking: It seems that one of the consequences of the culture wars is that Supreme Court nominees have gotten younger.  Presidents want their picks to be around for some time, since they have such a lasting effect on the country.  Thus, they go in for younger candidates.  From the perspective of developmental psychology, that means we are shifting the Court’s center of gravity downward into the developmental stages where ego and ideology are much more important.  As people age, many will transcend these constraints and develop more complex worldviews where selfless service and vision trump legacies and litmus tests.  Having an older court, while providing less longevity for a president’s agenda, may be better for the country.