Will Pa. be next to ban the ‘surprisingly prevalent’ practice of child marriage?
This summer, New Jersey made 18 the minimum age for marriage, with no exceptions. Pennsylvania lawmakers are now considering a similar bill.
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As the country reckons with sexual abuse and how it's been normalized in American culture, lawmakers have set their sights on something that's as old as the hills: child marriage.
Twelve states have either tightened age requirements for marriage or, like New Jersey, set the minimum age to 18, with no exceptions. Pennsylvania lawmakers are considering following New Jersey's lead.
Nearly 58,000 American teenagers between the ages of 15 and 17 were married in 2014, according to a Pew report. That's five of every 1,000 in that age group. In Pennsylvania, the number is just under the national average. According to data gathered by the nonprofit Unchained at Last, which advocates for ending child marriage, it's generally young girls who are marrying older men.
In a Washington Post piece that described the practice as "surprisingly prevalent," a couple was profiled in the central Pennsylvania town of Everett, a two-hour drive east of Pittsburgh. When they married, Maria Vargas was 16 and Phil Manning was 25.
In Pennsylvania, the age requirement for a marriage license is 18, but there are exceptions. Teenagers between the ages of 16 and 17 can get legal married if they win consent from a parent or guardian. (In Maria's case, her mother gave her consent.) Those ages 15 or younger can get a marriage license "if a court decides it is in the applicant's best interest, and [has] parental consent," according to a memo by the state's senators.
Legislators pushing to change the laws point to research that suggests that nearly 70 percent of child marriage ends in divorce.
"Teen brides are nearly three times as likely to have at least five children," the Washington Post reported, summarizing research around the issue. "Their chance of living in poverty is 31 percent higher. And they're 50 percent more likely to drop out of school."
In 2017, New Jersey Gov. Christopher J. Christie vetoed a bill that would have made New Jersey the first state to ban children under the age of 18 from marrying, saying it would interfere with religious customs. In June, Gov. Phil Murphy signed the law.