West Virginia will no longer allow children under 16 to marry, after the governor signed a compromise bill Wednesday.
The law signed by Republican Gov. Jim Justice continues allowing children ages 16 and 17 to get married with restrictions. Under the new law, those minors must get parental consent and can’t marry someone more than four years older than them. Existing legal marriages, and those done in other states, are unaffected.
Previously, anyone younger than 16 could have gotten married with a judge’s waiver.
Similar bills to ban child marriage were proposed in recent years but didn’t get traction.
Some Democrats, including the bill’s sponsor, Del. Kayla Young of Kanawha County, had hoped to eliminate child marriage altogether. Some Republicans in the GOP-dominated Legislature spoke about how they or their parents had married before adulthood and argued that state recognition of the relationships helps keep families together.
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