Help end child marriage in California. Join Zonta USA, Unchained at Last and others to end this human rights abuse that traps children, mostly girls, and impacts their access to education, social services, and is linked to domestic violence, financial abuse and early pregnancy and health consequences.
17 states as of June 2026 have eliminated Child Marriage. However, child marriage remains legal in 33 states and is happening in the U.S. at an alarming rate: Unchained’s groundbreaking research revealed that nearly 300,000 children as young as 10 were married in the U.S. between 2000 and 2018 – mostly girls wed to adult men.
Child marriage, or marriage before age 18, was legal in all 50 U.S. states as of 2017, based on archaic laws at the state level. Delaware and New Jersey in 2018 became the first two states to end this human rights abuse, followed by American Samoa in 2018, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Pennsylvania and Minnesota in 2020, Rhode Island and New York in 2021, Massachusetts in 2022, Michigan, Vermont and Connecticut in 2023, Washington, Virginia and New Hampshire in 2024, and DC, Maine, Oregon and Missouri in 2025, and Oklahoma in 2026.
More than 8,000 California children are entered into marriage every year, and the annual number has been increasing in recent years. As of 2021, more than 14,000 minors living in California already had been married. 100% of these marriages would have been considered a sex crime outside of marriage, because a child-marriage license is a “get out of jail free” card for a would-be child rapist. Sex with a child under age 18 is a sex crime in California unless the perpetrator first marries the child.
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Thousands of Children in the USA are missing out on education and the chance to be a child. Marriages of young girls, whether forced or coerced, result in devastating outcome. But California has not yet followed 15 other states who have outlawed this shameful and archaic practice. Child Marriage increased during Covid, and Unchained’s groundbreaking research revealed that nearly 300,000 children as young as 10 were married in the U.S. between 2000 and 2018 – mostly girls wed to adult men. Shockingly, California is one of a very few states that does not compile statistics on child marriage, and has no reporting.
Act Now- Message Governor Newsom
The California coalition is led by Unchained At Last and includes individual and organizational allies as well as forced and child marriage survivors.
Organizations
Lancaster, CA
Berkeley, CA
Burbank, CA
Thousand Oaks, CA
Mountain View, CA
Folsom, CA
Costa Mesa, CA
Porterville, CA
Riverside, CA
Sacramento, CA
Santa Clarita, CA
Torrance, CA
Forced and Child Marriage Survivors
At its August 2026 Annual Conference, the American Bar Association (ABA) House of Delegates adopted [...]
The Fresno Collegian summarizes the progress in the CA Assembly quite well. Reporter Manpreet [...]
AB1267 Would End Child Marriage in California Introduced by Assembly member Gail Pellerin and co-sponsored [...]
Oklahoma ended child marriage today and not a minute too soon. Child marriage endangers children’s [...]
Here’s a shout out to Kate Yang who was interviewed by The Fresno State Collegian, [...]
Persistence of Child Marriage in the USA Unchained At Last’s most recent research update, published [...]
Missouri becomes the 16th state to end child marriage in the USA. Missouri Governor [...]
VAWA 2022 § 1204(c) Report to Congress UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE OFFICE ON VIOLENCE [...]
National Coalition to End Child Marriage
End Gender-Violence Zonta Says NO!
US Women at the UN
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