CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — West Virginia will no longer allow children under 16 to marry after the governor signed a compromise bill into law Wednesday.
The law signed by Republican Gov. Jim Justice continues to allow 16- and 17-year-olds to marry with restrictions. Under the new law, those minors must obtain parental consent and cannot marry someone who is older than them by more than four years. Existing legal marriages and those performed in other states are not affected.
Previously, anyone under the age of 16 could have married with a judge’s waiver.
Similar bills to ban child marriage have been proposed in recent years but have failed.
Some democrats, including the bill’s sponsor, Del. Kayla Young of Kanawha County, hoped to eliminate child marriage entirely. Some republicans in the GOP-dominated Legislature they spoke about how they or their parents had married before adulthood and argued that state recognition of relationships helps keep families together.
Young said he had to compromise with fellow Republicans to secure a minimum age for marriage and welcomed the aspect of the bill that prohibited large age differences.
Supporters of such legislation say it reduces domestic violence, unwanted pregnancies and improves the lives of adolescents.
West Virginia had the highest rate of child marriages among states, according to the Pew Research Center. There were about seven marriages per 1,000 children ages 15 to 17 in West Virginia based on data collected between 2010 and 2014, compared with about 4.6 marriages per 1,000 for the same age group nationwide. More recent figures were not available.
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This story has been updated to correct the figures for teen marriages in West Virginia.
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