Yesterday Gov. Tim Walz signed HF745/SF1393 to end child marriage in Minnesota.
Yes, you recall correctly that five days ago Pennsylvania also ended child marriage — an extraordinary succession of human rights victories during a global pandemic. We are now four down, 46 to go in our campaign to end marriage before 18, without exceptions, in every U.S. state.
Together we helped to achieve the victory in Minnesota, led by Rep. Kaohly Her and Sen. Sandy Pappas and in partnership with the Minnesota Coalition to End Child Marriage that we formed, which includes AHA Foundation, American Atheists, Child USA, Child USAdvocacy, Global Citizen, ERA Minnesota, Kelly Nicole Foundation, Minnesota Nurses Association, UNICEF USA, World Without Genocide, Zonta District 7, Zonta International Club of Minneapolis and members of the National Coalition to End Child Marriage.
Armed with in-depth legal research conducted on a pro bono basis by the law firms White & Case and Morgan, Lewis & Bockius, and with generous funding from partners including Lush Charity Pot and Jewish Women’s Foundation of Greater Palm Beaches, we met with, emailed and called every Minnesota legislator and the governor repeatedly to urge them to pass HF745/SF1393. We also Chained-In in St. Paul earlier this year, dressed in bridal gowns and chains (when the outside temperature was about -35), to protest child marriage.
Under previous Minnesota law (which will change effective August 1), children age 16 and 17 could marry with parental “consent,” which is often parental coercion, and judicial approval. As of 2014, an estimated 1,142 children age 15 to 17 living in Minnesota had already been married.
Children can easily be forced to marry or to stay in a marriage before they turn 18, because they have limited legal rights. Further, marriage before 18 produces such devastating, lifelong repercussions for girls that the U.S. State Department has called it a “human rights abuse.”
Our advocacy has helped to end this human rights abuse in Delaware, New Jersey, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Pennsylvania — and now Minnesota. American Samoa, too, has ended child marriage. Which state or territory is next?