Marrying a first cousin was perfectly acceptable in the early 1800s, and the practice certainly offered some advantages: wealth and property were more likely to remain in the same hands, and it was easier for young women to meet and be courted by single people within the family circle. Later in the 19th century, however, marriage between cousins became rarer. Increased mobility due to the growth of the railroad and other widespread economic improvements greatly expanded the circle of a young woman`s future husbands. In Victorian times, awareness of reproductive birth defects among parents increased. However, cousin marriages remained popular among the upper class. Charles Darwin, for example, married his first cousin Emma Wedgwood, and Queen Victoria and Prince Albert were first cousins themselves. Aztec family law generally followed customary law. Men married between the ages of 20 and 22, and women generally married between the ages of 15 and 18. [24] The growing aversion to child marriage over time is also partly a story of perceived American exceptionalism and belief in the advance of “civilization.” Since the early nineteenth century, many Americans believe that child marriage is practiced only in other places — India, Afghanistan, various African countries — or, if in the United States, only by religious sects, where several girls are married against their will to an older man. These versions of child marriage – forced unions arranged by parents, sometimes the exchange for a dowry, wives under twelve – are indeed different from what usually happens in the US, where married girls tended to be teenagers and usually made the decision to marry themselves. But characterizing child marriage as foreign (whether national or religious, or both) also allows Americans to ignore the marriage of the young among them.
From the accounts of Christian missionaries in India in the early nineteenth century to contemporary scandals surrounding fundamentalist Latter-day Saints in Colorado and Utah, Americans have portrayed youth marriage as something practiced only by backward people who live elsewhere or deliberately flout the law when they live here. The minimum age of 12 and 14 was eventually incorporated into English civil law. By default, these provisions became the minimum age of marriage in colonial America. [10] Marriages took place, on average, a few years earlier in colonial America than in Europe, and much higher proportions of the population eventually married. Community studies suggest an average age of marriage of about 20 for women in the early colonial period and about 26 for men. [29] In the late 19th century and throughout the 20th century, U.S. states began to slowly raise the legal age at which individuals could marry. Age restrictions have been revised upwards, as in most developed countries, so that they are now between 15 and 21 years old.
[10] The narrative in this book could be read as a triumphal march, from a time when children married because no one valued childhood and adult women were treated like children anyway, to a time when we don`t allow children to marry because we protect them and understand the institution of marriage differently than early Americans. There is some truth to this narrative, in part because the incidence of teenage marriage declined in the twentieth century (with the exception of the 1950s). Nevertheless, I hope to complicate this arc in several ways. The 55 Parties to the 1962 Convention on Consent to Marriage, Minimum Age for Marriage and Registration of Marriages have agreed to legislate on a minimum age for marriage in order to override customary, religious and tribal laws and traditions. If the age of marriage according to the law of a religious community is lower than that provided for by the law of the country, the law of the State prevails. However, some religious communities do not accept the primacy of state law in this regard, which can lead to child or forced marriage. The 123 parties to the 1956 Supplementary Convention on the Abolition of Slavery agreed to introduce a mandatory minimum “reasonable” age for marriage. In many developing countries, official age requirements are only guidelines. UNICEF, the United Nations Children`s Organization, considers the marriage of a minor (legal child), a person under adulthood, as a child marriage and as a violation of rights. [1] In many states (but not Massachusetts),[2] a minor`s marriage automatically emancipates the minor or increases the minor`s legal rights beyond the minor`s permission to consent to certain medical treatments. [3] A ketannah (literally “little”) was a girl aged 3 to 12 years plus a day; [281] She was under the authority of her father and he could arrange the marriage for her without her consent. [281] However, after reaching the age of majority, she would have to consent to the marriage in order to be considered married. [282] [283] Maya family law appears to be based on customary law.