RALEIGH, N.C. — The North Carolina House unanimously passed a bill Wednesday that would raise the legal age to marry from 14 to 16, moving the state a bit closer to banning child marriage altogether.
But Wednesday’s vote seemed unlikely earlier this year.
When lawmakers first proposed Senate Bill 35 the plan was to ban marriage under 18 outright.
“Research indicates that people who marry as minors face increased dropout rates from both high school and college, increased medical and mental health problems, and markedly increased likelihood of future poverty,” Rep. Kristin Baker said in a news release following the vote. “This bill raises the age of marriage to 16. It also sets limits on age gaps for marriage of minors ages 16 and 17, thus serving as a deterrent for those who would target North Carolina as a destination state for human trafficking.”
Human trafficking was a large concern for the bill sponsors in both the Senate and the House, which had its own version of the bill.
But Sen. Danny Britt told his colleagues in May on the Senate floor that he couldn’t get support for that version of the bill because lawmakers had told him they either married teenagers, married as a teenager or knew someone who had.
Britt compromised and amended the bill to ban marriage under 16. And for those ages 16 and 17, they couldn’t marry anyone more than four years older.
The Senate passed the bill and sent it to the House where it received a favorable report on June 22.
And then it stalled.
The child marriage bill stalled when it was sent to the Families, Children and Aging Policy committee led by Rep. Jerry Carter, a Rockingham County Republican.
After Carter’s death last week, the bill moved out of his committee and into the Rules committee which sent the bill to the House floor.
“This bill is a great bill for young people in our state, if passed,” said Rep. Kristin Baker, on Wednesday, as she presented the bill.
Her co-sponsor, Ashton Wheeler Clemmons, thanked child marriage survivors who provided their stories to North Carolina lawmakers.
“This bill has been a great honor to work on with Rep. Baker, Sen. (Vickie) Sawyer and Sen. (Valerie) Foushee from the Senate, and most especially because it’s from the courage of the women who were willing to tell their story, and I wanted to name them because we would only be making this progress with their courage to tell their stories: Donna Pollard, Dr. Judy Wiegand, Sherry Johnson and an anonymous woman survivor from Eden, N.C. and Rep. Baker and I have had a flag flown in each of their honors.”
Wiegand, who married at 13, and the anonymous survivor, who married at 15, also provided their stories to The News & Observer.
Currently, North Carolina and Alaska are the only two states where children as young as 14 can marry if they become pregnant and have parental consent. Child marriage is still legal in most states with many having no age restrictions, whatsoever.
Because the House judiciary committee made some changes to the bill, it has to return to the Senate for final approval before going to Gov. Roy Cooper.
“I am extremely proud to see this critical bill moving forward in the NC House,” Clemmons said. “It is past time that we protect young people — especially young girls — from the well-documented negative impacts of child marriage.”
