The New Hampshire state legislature was debating a bill which would ban teen marriage by raising the minimum age to be married to 18 years old. It was during this debate when State Representative Jess Edwards gave a most disturbing comment:

Rep. Jess Edwards argued that taking away the possibility of marriage could lead more 16- and 17-year-olds to abortion.

“… If we continually restrict the freedom of marriage as a legitimate social option, when we do this to people who are a ripe, fertile age and may have a pregnancy and a baby involved, are we not in fact making abortion a much more desirable alternative, when marriage might be the right solution for some freedom-loving couples?” he said.

Hey, Jess! Keep it in your pants, you old lecher!

Another Republican lawmaker was almost as disgusting:

Republican lawmakers have opposed raising the marriage age in recent years. On Thursday, Rep. Margaret Drye, a Plainfield Republican, argued there were some circumstances in which marriage was a beneficial option for those under 18.

Drye recounted two times when a friend or a family member had obtained judicial approval for a marriage below the age of 16 because of an unexpected pregnancy.

“They elected to get married because that offered to the young woman things that she didn’t have before: stability, provision, protection, and a chance for a young family to be a family before a baby arrived,” she said. “The goal was still the same: marriage and raising a family together. They just got there in a little different timeline.”

Not quite, lady. If you have some guy going around raping teenage girls, he's probably not going to be able to provide much stability or anything else. And he sure as hell ain't protecting her if he is assaulting her.

The good news is that the state legislature passed the bill and sent it to the governor's desk. If the governor signs it, the audible sigh of relief from the teen girls in the state will be audible all across the country.