The Florida House has overwhelmingly voted for a bill that would keep anyone under the age of 17 from getting married.
- Bill approved 109-1 in Florida House
- Person marrying 17-year-old can't be more than 2 years older
- South Florida GOP Rep. George Moraitis was lone 'no' vote
- Gov. Scott will sign it, his office says
Lawmakers approved the bill Friday, 109-1. Gov. Scott's office says he will sign it.
The Senate had originally voted to ban marriages under 18. Friday's measure stemmed from a compromise with the Senate.
The bill says anyone marrying a 17-year-old can't be more than two years older, and minors need parental consent.
Under current law, 16- and 17-year-olds can marry, provided they have the consent of both sets of parents. If a pregnancy is involved, there's no minimum age for marriage if a judge approves.
A legislative analysis showed that between 2012 and 2016, 1,828 marriage licenses were issued in Florida to couples where at least one person was a minor.
In one case, a man over the age of 90 was able to marry a girl who was 16 or 17.
The bill's passage was a victory for Sherry Johnson, who worked for 6 years to get the bill passed. Johnson was forced at 11 years old to marry a church deacon who raped her when she was 9 years old. She gave birth to his first child when she was 10.
It was several years before she was able to get out of her marriage, and in those years she ended up giving him five more children.
On Friday, she was hailed as a hero for her efforts.
But not everyone supported the bill.
South Florida Republican Rep. George Moraitis was the lone "no" vote Friday. He said last month it's "very reasonable" to allow 16- and 17-year-olds to marry with parental consent, regardless of whether the girl is pregnant.
"There's literally only a handful of cases that would fall under what I would say are potentially abusive," said Moraitis. "To focus on a 10-year-old or an 11-year-old or something like that when we're talking about the hundreds and hundreds of people that could get married. I'm particularly focused on the pregnancy aspect of it. I don't want the message to be that it's better to not get married."
The Associated Press contributed to this story.