**Expat Alabamian living in Pennsylvania**

Let's just hope they don't figure out how accidentally liberal they will be.

and put them in the hands of preachers? I'm not sure that is such a good thing.

You file the paperwork and you are married.

or solely in the hands of preachers.


History will show you why and how the State got involved in marriage laws
but before then, for hundreds of years, people became married at what we know as a county/community level,
no licenses, and often months before a preacher showed up to do a religious ceremony.
In Europe, civil marriages are quite common, involving signatures on a form.

This law will simply have marriages recorded, like births and deaths are recorded, at the county Gov. level.
No licenses will be needed.
No county judges will perform any ceremony.
Anyone can also have a religious ceremony if they want, but that will be in addition to the recording at the courthouse.

We will eliminate it.




Just watch, they will try to make an end-around the SCOTUS ruling.

This is only the first step.


This is done as a reaction to gay marriage.



there wasn't a push to get government out of marriage before that.



Motive, and timing make this suspicious.

It will eliminate the Probate Judge from officiating at the marriage
and remove the required license.
Instead, the only thing that will change is the paperwork to get married

Marriage will be a form registration process.
the form will be legal, so will the marriage.

It is done this way all over the world, esp. Europe, as a civil marriage.

Makes the bigoted county clerks happy, makes it easier in fact to get married,
does not prevent any religious service after the forms are signed.

To my mind, it is a win-win.

many times I have needed marriage and divorce papers to qualify for some program. These programs are also going to have to change.

If it's only a problem for minorities, they might not care.

If you get married in Ala. today, you buy a license.
someone ( a judge, or a minister,) mumbles some words in front of you and signs a marriage certificate.

The license and certificate are kept by the county for their records.
That is why when you need them, you can get a copy.

Under the new law, a copy of the registry form will be kept, and I imagine they will charge about the same fee as they did for a license.

And any claim of child support...not such a great idea.

Marriage is still gonna happen.
records are still gonna be kept.
The only thing that will change is the paperwork to get married
and the elimination of the probate judge to say some words.
Marriage will be a form registration process.
the form will be legal, so will the marriage, so divorce will still go on.

It is done this way all over the world, esp. Europe, as a civil marriage.

separation of church and state. If so, Alabama has always performed only civil unions, of course, and never did perform sacred unions, i.e., what "marriage" is considered to be to religious people.

Alabama now is just like any other state, where you get a license, you choose whether to have a county judge,or a justice of the peace, or a minister mumble the words.

The new law will eliminate the license and the county judge, and instead will deem a marriage is valid by the couple signing a marriage form.
One can still have a religious ceremony in addition to that.

It still will forbid underage marriages.

I'm not going to applaud them for that.

It really does make things easier for most people now, tho.