GOP official argues in favor of child marriage: Girls are ‘ripe’ and ‘fertile’

The New Hampshire House passed a bill to ban child marriage in the state and raise the minimum age of marriage to 18.

The measure passed the Senate unanimously in March. On Thursday, it passed the House, 192-174. The bill now goes to Gov. Chris Sununu for signing into law.

One of those voting against was Representative Jess Edwards, whose comments sparked immediate gasps from colleagues.

“… If we continually restrict the freedom of marriage as a legitimate social option, when we do this to people who are a ripe, fertile age and may have a pregnancy and a baby involved, are we not, in fact, making abortion a much more desirable alternative, when marriage might be the right solution for some freedom-loving couples?” he said.

In a state where 18 is not old enough to drink, Edwards believes girls at 16 are old enough to get married. Edwards’ daughter, Elizabeth, served as a state representative, and Edwards said her service was the inspiration for his run for office. He is in his third term.

Child safety and gun control advocate Shannon Watts tweeted that “Child marriage is currently legal in 38 states (only Connecticut, Delaware, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and Vermont have set the minimum age at 18 and eliminated all exceptions), and 20 states do not require any minimum age for marriage.”

It would be the second time the New Hampshire age of marriage has been raised in the past six years. In 2018, Sununu signed a bill to raise the minimum age of marriage to 16. For more than a hundred years, the law had allowed 13-year-old girls and 14-year-old boys to get married with parent and court approval.

On Thursday, two amendments were proposed to allow some exceptions for those under 18 to get married if they have been legally emancipated.

Rep. Cassandra Levesque, D-Barrington, was a senior at Dover High School and a Girl Scout when she pushed for the bill in 2018. Now, she is one of the seven co-sponsors of SB 359.

“For the past 10 years, I have researched child marriage,” Levesque said. “I’ve learned about the devastating effects of child marriage.”