Kentucky's 'child bride' bill stalls as groups fight to let 13-year-olds wed [View all]
Source: Courier-Journal
Deborah Yetter, Louisville Courier Journal Published 4:08 p.m. ET March 1, 2018 | Updated 11:32 a.m. ET March 2, 2018
FRANKFORT, Ky. — A bill to make 18 the legal age for marriage in Kentucky has stalled in a Senate committee amid concerns about the rights of parents to allow children to wed at a younger age, according to several lawmakers.
Known as the "child bride" bill, Senate Bill 48 was pulled off the agenda just hours before a scheduled vote by the Senate Judiciary Committee for the second time in two weeks.
"SO disappointed! My SB 48 (outlaw child marriage) won’t be called for a vote," sponsor Julie Raque Adams, a Louisville Republican, said in a Tweet early Thursday. "It is disgusting that lobbying organizations would embrace kids marrying adults. We see evidence of parents who are addicted, abusive, neglectful pushing their children into predatory arms. Appalling."
Eileen Recktenwald, the executive director of the Kentucky Association of Sexual Assault Programs, was more outspoken. "This is legalized rape of children," she said. "We cannot allow that to continue in Kentucky, and I cannot believe we are even debating this is the year 2018 in the United States."
Read more: https://www.courier-journal.com/story/news/politics/2018/03/01/child-marriage-kentucky-brides-parents-rights/385489002/
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