Hoyer calls the US the "longest lasting constitutional democracy in the world." I've been idly poking around this evening, trying to figure out which country actually deserves that title.

My criteria are that a country is a democracy if its government is elected, if it has more-or-less universal adult suffrage, and if it doesn't disenfranchise racial or ethnic minorities.

So you don't get to count years before women didn't have the vote, which rules out everyone before the late 19th century.

New Zealand was one of the first countries to grant women the vote, and they didn't completely exclude Maori from the vote, but they had a separate franchise for the Maori for a long time, so I don't think they count.

Not sure what to do with countries which experience a democratic hiatus because of, say, invasion. Also not sure whether the House of Lords is disqualifying for Britain (and if so, for how long).

Anyway, I haven't dug deep enough to have a definitive answer, but it seems like whatever the oldest democracy is, it's probably about a hundred years old. Maybe.

Norway might be the answer, if you don't disqualify them because of the Nazi occupation. If you disqualify Norway, then maybe Ireland? https://twitter.com/johnbroich/status/1347007446854807553