This paper investigates the role of debt maturity in a very simple context in which policy precommitment is allowed, but state-contingent debt cannot be issued and a constraint on the level of deficit is imposed. In line with the optimal taxation approach, it shows that in such a context debt maturity has a role to play. Optimal maturity lengthens with the volatility of the interest rate and the size of debt; it shortens with the volatility of government spending and in the presence of a negative correlation between changes in interest rates and government financing needs.By looking at the evidence in some EU countries, the paper investigates whether the introduction of constraints on deficit and debt levels has determined a change in debt management policies. This indirectly provides a test of the optimal taxation argument for public debt design.