With 50 states, we have 50 different version of sexual age of consent laws. But when these laws were written people tended to live in one place their whole lives. But now we move mcuh more frequently than we used to. For work, schooling, change of scenery, etc. So isn't making one nationwide age of consent sensible?
The differences between the states isn't insignificant is the biggest problem.
"In New Jersey, the legal age of consent applies for teenagers between ages 13 and 16 as long as the other sexual actor is within four years of age. Montana's age of consent is 16, meaning anyone under sixteen is not legally able to consent to sex. For example, a 16 year-old may not have sex with 15 year old, and could face 2 to 100 years in prison as a result of doing so."
http://sex-crimes.laws.com/statutory-rape/state-variations
As above, a perfectly law-abidding teenager of 13 may have legal sexual relationships with other 13 year-olds, yet if he then moves to Montana (for the sake of arguement) with his 13 year-old lover, they could be suddenly be faced with having to discontinue their relationships until the age in which is resumes being legal. Or for a more realistic version, two NJ families go on vacation together to Montana, and what was a legal relationship back home is now illegal in Montana.
We desperately need to fix this sort of issue by making age of sexual consent uniform so every state uses the same standard. Can do this legislatively by making sex (the age of consent to engage in it) a federal law instead of state law. As is already the case with hate crimes.
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