
Contents
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English Common Law and the Origins of Twelve and Fourteen English Common Law and the Origins of Twelve and Fourteen
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Colonial Antecedents to State Statutes Colonial Antecedents to State Statutes
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Revolutionary and Antebellum Modifications Revolutionary and Antebellum Modifications
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New States Enter the Union New States Enter the Union
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The Ages of Majority and Differently Gendered Adulthood The Ages of Majority and Differently Gendered Adulthood
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One Any Maid or Woman Child: A New Nation and Its Marriage Laws
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Published:October 2016
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Abstract
This chapter explains the English common law and colonial legal antecedents to early national marriage law in the extant states. It argues that the common law marriage ages of twelve (for girls) and fourteen (for boys) are based on presumptions about puberty and intellectual capacity, and that when North American colonial legislatures raised these ages, they did so largely to protect parental interest in their children’s labor and possible fortunes, not as a means to protect youthful people. It also argues that the differential ages of marriage and of majority (in western and midwestern states, where girls’ majority was lowered to eighteen) all had the effect of denying girls the protection of girlhood in the realm of marriage that were being offered to their brothers and to children more generally in legal revisions of the ealry modern period.
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