I was twenty when we were married. Twenty years and one week to be precise. At the time I thought I was old enough and mature enough to make responsible decisions. As it turned out the decision to marry was one of the really great decisions of my life. I’m glad we were married. I’m glad we married when we did.

At twenty, I measured my life by landmark years. I got my driver’s license when I was 15. I soloed in an airplane when I was 16. I got my pilot’s license when I was 17. I continued to count landmark years for a while. I graduated from college when I was 21. I completed my doctorate when I was 25. I was ordained at 25. Our first child was born when I was 27. Of course, the year doesn’t reveal all of the details of my age. I got my driver’s license on my birthday. I was married one week after my birthday. I graduated from college and graduate school just before my birthday. Our son was born nine months after my birthday. These days I’m less precise my thinking about age. When asked, I often say, “I’m in my seventies.” Sometimes I’ll say, “I’m in my early seventies.” When we married, I was aware of the age difference between me and my wife. These days that difference seems meaningless. I feel like we are the same age. After all we are both at an age when we feel younger some days and older on other days.

I was thinking about the age of marriage recently because the law just changed in Washington where I live. As of June 5, no person under the age of 18 is allowed to marry in our state. Previously a 17-year-old could be married with parental consent, and anyone younger than 17 could be married with a judge’s permission.

In colonial America, English common law was the general practice until specific states enacted laws to modify it. Under those laws the minimum age as 12 years for females and 14 years for males. Marriage licenses were not required until 1753 in England and different states had different rules regarding marriage licenses in the early years of our nation’s organization. This system developed into different laws regarding marriage in individual states. Those laws are changing. Most states are moving to a uniform age for males and females and the general marriage age has been trending downward. The minimum age for Several New England States, Virginia, Michigan, and Minnesota share the 18 year marriage age with Washington. The age is 17 in about 10 states. In a majority of the states 16 is the minimum age, though some require consent of a parent or a judge to marry at that age. In Kansas and Hawaii the minimum age is 15, while California, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Mississippi have no minimum age, though the general age for marriage without consent or court approval is 18 in all states except Nebraska, where it is 19 and Mississippi where it is 21. The details of other states isn’t something one has to keep in mind unless you are an officiating clergy person who crosses state lines.

During my career as a minister, I checked out the laws governing marriage to be sure that I was in compliance with state laws as an officiant. For example, Idaho required a clergy person to be registered in order to officiate at a wedding when we lived there. Idaho also had very lenient common law marriages. Couples who had jointly owned property but who had not gone through a marriage ceremony sometimes found out to their surprise that they were indeed legally married. I knew of one case where one member of a couple had to obtain a divorce in order to get a license for what he had though was his first marriage.

When we lived in South Dakota the law was changed to make it a misdemeanor for a clergy person to perform a wedding ceremony if there was not a legal license from the state present. The law was enacted in an attempt to prevent clergy from performing marriage ceremonies for same gender marriages, but a few clergy persons received fines for signing marriage licenses with expired dates or for returning a license to the Register of Deeds late. A license becomes void after 90 days in South Dakota and the executed license must be filed within 10 days for the marriage to be valid. I don’t believe that the South Dakota law had any effect on clergy who performed marriages for gay couples. That became moot once the Supreme Court declared equal access to marriage for all couples.

I once officiated at a wedding in Oregon at which a Washington license was presented. Since I was unaware of the legality of such an action, the couple, witnesses, and I drove across the state line and executed the license, marking the place of marriage in Washington rather than Oregon where the ceremony had taken place.

I learned early on in my career to have a routine for executing a marriage license properly. In some states the couple has to sign on the day of the ceremony. In others the couple does not sign, only the officiant and the witnesses. I learned that it is easier to specify exactly when and where the license will be signed after the ceremony to avoid having to run down a witness in the middle of a reception. Different states have different age requirements for witnesses to ceremonies. Some states have waiting periods after the license is issued before it can be executed, sometimes called a waiting period.

Some of my clergy friends see the church ceremony and the civil ceremony as completely separate and do not sign civil licenses, requiring couples to have a civil ceremony in addition to the church service.

I don’t know exactly what the laws should be, but there have been some important national conversations about marriage including overturning laws attempting to prevent miscegenation and gay marriage.

In our case, however, I’m glad that we were able to obtain a license to marry when I was 20. It seems to have worked out wonderfully well. Besides, we lived together and owned joint property in Idaho for a decade, so I’m certain we’d be legally married anyway.