The Knot That Binds Itself

The Prof has started his sabbatical and is beginning to take classes at Big-Self-Important-Ivy-League University. He’ll also be taking some classes at Smaller-Less-Important-But-Still-Snooty Big City University in another week, when their semester begins. Between his preparations to re-enter the world of higher education from the other side of the mirror and his recent travelling, it has fallen to me to research what we need to do to get married.

One happy discovery: our state does not require blood tests any more. The Prof is afraid of needles on a Tony-Shalhoub-as-Monk level, and I doubt we’d be getting married if that requirement were still in place. A less happy discovery was that our state no longer recognizes common law marriage, which would have been the easiest way to go about this. No matter – I’ve been gathering together what we need to do to get this piece of business accomplished.

Prices
I don’t know about other states, but ours permits each county to determine the cost of applying for a marriage license within its borders. If you are a state resident, you may apply in any county of the state. My county charges about $45 for the application. The closest adjoining county charges $60. Another county within an hour of here charges $75. The cheapest fee I could find in our state was $40, and the most expensive (Big City Court House) was $80. Since it’s the same damned piece of paper for the same damned service, I find it somewhat astonishing that there is such a wide discrepancy in the cost of applying for a marriage license.

Previously Married
Yup, that would be me. This part looked to be straightforward. All I need to do is present a certified copy of the divorce decree when we apply for the license. I’ve kept my copy of the divorce decree in the safe deposit box. I went on Monday to pick it up and discovered that my ex had sent me a photocopy of his certified decree. That meant a trip into the County Seat on Tuesday, and a $5 fee to obtain a certified copy of the decree. It turned out to be easy enough to get, though I was lucky I had the photocopy with the decree number on it. It would have cost me $8 additional if I’d had to have them look up the number first.

Of course, on my way back to the car I tripped over an uneven portion of the brick sidewalk behind the courthouse and fell, scraping my hand and slightly tearing the certified copy of the decree. Hopefully it’s still valid.

Self Uniting

My state is one of two in the Union that permits something called a “self-uniting” marriage. Simply put, this means that you do not need an outside officiant to oversee the marriage ceremony and send in the application once the ceremony is completed. The couple themselves, with two witnesses, can process their own marriage as they see fit, and submit the completed application for their marriage certificate. This was written into my state’s constitution because one of the prominent religions in my state in its earliest days performed weddings in that manner.

While the concept is easy, the actual follow-through in recent years has been a different matter. Many county clerks are unaware of this option, and have refused couples who have applied for this. Some counties have court officials who feel that self-uniting licenses should only be issued to couples practicing specific faiths, and turn away other applicants. The ACLU has taken at least four of these cases to court, protesting that the State is discriminating on the basis of religion, and has won each time. As near as I can tell, though, some counties persist in refusing to issue self-uniting licenses to anyone who isn’t of a specific faith.

While I make no secret of it, I don’t get into my own religious beliefs in this diary. I am an atheist. I have no problem with the religious convictions of others, so long as they do not feel it is their duty to convert me to whatever it is they believe. But I see marriage as a civil filing, not as a religious rite, and I (and the Prof) would absolutely prefer a self-uniting license. Today, when we head for the County Seat Courthouse we will attempt to apply for one. Our county is not one of those on the list of counties who have been taken to court regarding this, and I found at least one website that indicates that our county is friendly to the idea of self-uniting licenses. I have hopes this process will be free of impediments.

I do not, however, intend to make this a court case. If they refuse, we’ll get the conventional license, and get the finalization done by whatever justice of the peace is available next week. However, if we’re forced to go that route I can assure you there will be a rant posted regarding this in a future update.

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4 Comments

  1. Very interesting. Last month hubby and I visited a married couple in the other state of the Union that allows the option of self-uniting. They also chose to do it that way.

    Although we had a civil ceremony and had no idea there were states where you could marry yourselves, we were just fine having the celebrant (as they called it in the state where we married) officiate. She told us she could wear either her robes or regular clothing. We chose the robes because we felt it lent an air of dignity and legitimacy to the event that might soothe our religious parents a little, even though they were happy we were getting married at all.

    I hope you will not meet with any difficulties. I so wish I could be one of the witnesses! *pout*

  2. I’m with Texan Elf, I wish I could witness, too! Barring the self-unification thing, I’m sure you can tell whomever performs the union that neither of you are religious in any way and to keep the whole god business to themselves. No prayers, no rights invested by the flying spaghetti monster in the sky– none of that. You can write your own vows promising to be there for each other and nothing more, if that is what you want. I can’t wait to read about it. 🙂

  3. What you said about marriage being a civil, not religious, union is how I feel about the gay marriage issue. People keep dragging religion into it when I don’t see that as a relevant argument. Just my opinion……

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