17-year-olds in Oregon are not yet old enough to cast ballots. Purchase a pack of smokes instead.
However, Sen. Janeen Sollman told a Senate committee on Wednesday that a 17-year-old is permitted to attend a chapel and get married.
Sollman, a Democrat from Hillsboro, has joined two of her Republican colleagues to support a bill that they all support: raising Oregon’s minimum marriage age to 18 without any exceptions. According to Sollman, parents don’t always behave in their children’s best interests, and 17-year-olds can currently get married provided one of their parents agrees.
Sollman told the Senate Judiciary Committee that the study demonstrates that children, particularly girls, who are married before the age of 18 are more likely to face poverty, domestic violence, high-risk adolescent pregnancies, mental health and substance use disorders, and frequently have few opportunities for advancement in their education and careers.
According to Sollman, many weddings between teenagers aged 17 and under are to older males, and they might be coerced into becoming victims of human trafficking.
With parental approval, children as young as 16 can get married in some places, such as Idaho.With a judge’s approval, Kansas sets the age as low as 15. Other states, like California, do not have a minimum age requirement as long as a court and a parent agree.
The child advocacy groups Unchained at Last and the United Nations Children’s Fund claim that eleven states, including Washington, have raised the marriage age to 18 without exception.
According to Sollman, although Oregon law permits 17-year-olds to be married with their parents’ consent, it doesn’t give them an escape route.
According to Sollman, even those who try to leave the marriage are not permitted to file for divorce while still minors, and they frequently find it difficult to defend themselves, leave the house, find shelters, and obtain protective orders.
Parents can compel 17-year-olds to marry for a variety of reasons, according to proponents of raising Oregon’s marriage age. These include wanting to conform to societal or cultural norms or wishing to release themselves from financial duties to support their children, which vanish after they are married. According to Michele Hanash of the national women’s advocacy group AHA Foundation, a 17-year-old in Oregon does not need to provide their consent to marriage; only their parent does. Advocates claim to have spoken with child brides who cried because they were unhappy with their marriage.
Eugene Democrat Floyd Prozanski, the Senate Judiciary Chair, questioned why a judge, clergyman, or other official would perform a wedding ceremony if the young couple was not willing to say “I do.”
Prozanski remarked, “Well, this isn’t happening,” if I were officiating that wedding. I wouldn’t do a ceremony for a seventeen-year-old.
According to Hanash, youngsters may be forced to accept marriage even if they don’t want to.
According to Hanash, they were too afraid to speak up.
Amy Turpin told the committee that she was heartbroken by her marriage to an older man, eight years her senior, while she was a teenager growing up in Marion County.
I had his child at 16, but I was married at 17. She said, “I met him at 15 years old.” Even though all of this ought to have been against the law, I didn’t really see any other choice because he was a wonderful man and stayed to marry me.
Turpin added that while teenage marriage had been common—her mother and grandmother had both married young—her family had approved of the union.
“Everything you’ve heard about this so far is a testament to my life,” Turpin added. I had a C-section during finals week, which prevented me from graduating from high school. Before I was eighteen, he transferred me out of state, leaving me stranded and alone.
She claimed that on the first day the bank was open following their wedding, her husband went there and took all of the money out of her account.
Since then, I’ve probably experienced every worst scenario you can think of,” Turpin said, adding that she was finally able to put that life behind and is now secure.
Sen. David Brock Smith, a Republican from Port Orford, and Sen. Kevin Mannix, a Republican from Salem, have also endorsed Senate Bill 548 in addition to Sollman, a Democrat. There are now 18 additional lawmakers who have joined as sponsors.
No one opposed the bill in their testimony.
This session, Aimee Green is covering the Oregon Legislature. You may contact her at [email protected] or 503-294-5119.
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