Morgan Kathleen Miller is a native of Ohio’s 94th House District, a 2018 graduate of Ashland University, and is now working in non-profit advocacy.
Elizabeth Siders is a victim.
The Ohio resident was 15 when she was legally married to a man across the Ohio River in West Virginia in 2008.
Such marriages were also legal in Ohio until 2019 when the marriage age was raised to 18 was with an exception that to this day allow 17-year-olds to wed.
A 15-year-old should never have to navigate being legally bound to the person who raped her. What happened to Siders should have been treated as a sex crime, yet the law at the time allowed the marriage to take place.
The numbers make clear that this is not an isolated problem. More than 5,000 minors were married
in Ohio between 2000 and 2024, according to an analysis by Unchained At Last using Ohio Department of Health data.
Ohio’s laws have evolved somewhat, but they still leave the door open for girls to be abused via marriage laws.
I was born and raised in Ohio, not far from where Elizabeth Siders was raised. She married 18-year-old Gary L. Siders Jr. in March of 2008 and had the first of their 18 children that May.
Now 34, Elizabeth Siders was indicted on 19 counts of child endangerment related to alleged crimes involving her 16 living children.
Her husband, Gary L. Siders Jr., and his parents, Gary L. Siders Sr. and Christina Siders, were also charged after authorities say they found the children hidden in a dilapidated home in the Vinton County village of Hamden.
Elizabeth and Gary Siders Jr., as well as Joshua Saunders III, the nephew of Gary Siders Jr., and Brandon Henderson, the partner of Saunders' mother, face charges alleging sexual misconduct involving two other children.
No child should marry in Ohio
Every Ohioan who cares about the safety and well-being of Ohio’s children should demand that the Ohio General Assembly pass Senate Bill 341 – closing the loophole that allows child marriage and establishing 18 as the minimum age for marriage with no exceptions.
There should be no complicated legal calculus when it comes to whether a child is old enough to marry.
An 18-year-old can make the decision to enter a marriage with full and free consent. A minor, who lacks legal agency, cannot. These are thousands of children whose lives were permanently altered by a legal system that should have protected them.
Senate Bill 341 offers a straightforward solution: establish 18 as the minimum age for marriage and eliminate the exceptions that allow children to enter into marriage.
Children need protection, not marriage licenses
The bill has already passed the Senate Judiciary Committee. It now awaits a vote when the Senate returns from summer recess.
Legislative inertia should not be allowed to become another obstacle to protecting Ohio’s children. If lawmakers fail to act, Senate Bill 341 would have to be reintroduced in the next General Assembly, delaying meaningful reform yet again.
There is no good reason to wait.
A bright-line age of 18 prevents minors from being abused and entering an arrangement that is defined by the U.S. State Department as a human rights abuse.
It creates a categorical distinction between a minor and an adult, limiting the power of individual judges to decide whether a child is “mature enough” to marry and eliminates the legal gray areas that can leave minors especially vulnerable.
Most importantly, it recognizes a simple truth: children need protection, not marriage licenses.
Thirty-three states have already passed laws banning child marriage. Those states have recognized that protecting children from the lifelong consequences of child marriage is not a partisan issue or a complicated one. It is a responsibility.
Ohio should be the 34th state to do the same.
Every Ohio child deserves the chance to grow up free from abuse and exploitation, so the legislature should pass Senate Bill 341.
Ohio’s children cannot afford another year of waiting.
Morgan Kathleen Miller is a native of Ohio’s 94th House District, a 2018 graduate of Ashland University, and is now working in non-profit advocacy.
This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Elizabeth Siders was a victim long before she gave birth to 18 kids | Opinion
