Sexual assault laws encompass what’s commonly called statutory rape, where the law prohibits and penalizes sexual activities based on the age of the perpetrator and the age of the victim. But these interactions are marked by power imbalances, vulnerability, and distortion of trust. Sexual assault laws criminalize sexual activity with minors because they recognize the potential for “ unequal, manipulative, predatory relationships.” In some cases, adolescents “consent” to sexual relationships with adults who lavish them with attention and gifts. This provides an important protective mechanism and relieves children the burden of having to demonstrate the element of coercion or force normally required in sexual assault cases. State laws assume that sexual activities between an adult and child below a certain age are coercive even if both people think they are voluntary. State laws protect children through several mechanisms, including criminal laws against sexual assault, sexual abuse, and exploitation.Įach state specifies the age of majority for sexual consent, which generally ranges from age sixteen to eighteen. Laws Protecting Children From Sexual Assault and Abuse The Supreme Court, too, has noted that minors are vulnerable to negative influences, pressure from family and peers, have limited control over their environment, and in many cases cannot remove themselves from dangerous settings. Adolescents may be influenced by peers, less future oriented, more impulsive, consider risks and rewards differently, and are still in the midst of developing their identity. Legal limitations recognize that adolescents may not make optimal decisions in their best interest based on this stage of development.

Proposals to recognize otherwise should be classified as what they are: an attempt to advocate for revising age of consent laws.īased on age and development, children – even adolescents – cannot fully appreciate the nature and consequences of serious decisions, which is why many areas of law ( general medical care, contracts, military service) do not ordinarily allow children to consent.Īdolescents differ in cognitive, emotional, and psychological development compared to adults.

Children and Consentīy law, children cannot consent to sexual conduct with adults. Although the ICJ’s mission calls for upholding the rule of law, this report instead outlines strategies to upend the rule of law and dismantle whole sectors of the criminal justice system. The ICJ is a group of sixty judges and attorneys from around the world who seek to influence legislative reform and impact judicial decision-making. Specifically, multiple areas of the report reference adolescents’ “evolving capacity to consent,” state that adolescents can consent to sexual conduct “in fact, if not in law,” and assert that enforcement of criminal law should not apply when these sexual acts are “consensual.” In each of these sections, the report does not reference any limitations on the age of the other person engaging in this “consensual” act. However, other human rights organizations have pointed out that the plain language of the report suggests otherwise. The ICJ published a clarification asserting the report does not call for this. “Consensual sexual conduct…may not be criminalized in any circumstances… Moreover, sexual conduct involving persons below the domestically prescribed minimum age of consent to sex may be consensual in fact, if not in law.” What’s the Controversy?Īfter publication of this report, several media stories declared that it was “ misinformation” to characterize that the report included sexual activities between adults and minors. Most notably, the report also calls to reexamine laws relating to consensual sexual conduct involving children under the age of majority and people with disabilities who ordinarily cannot “consent.” Recently, the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ) published a report advocating for significant revisions to criminal law, such as decriminalizing prostitution intentional transmission of HIV and purchasing and possessing drugs for personal use.

Legal age of consent