RTP-area local music and culture

[Nathaniel Florin <npflorin AT yahoo.com>]

I googled common-law marriages and found this:

http://www.itslegal.com/infonet/family/common.html

No idea if this is accurate at all, but some of the
criteria for a common-law marriage have an air of
deception about them. In SC "A common-law marriage is
established if a man and woman intend for others to
believe they are married." Colorado: "A common-law
marriage may be established by proving cohabitation
and a reputation of being married." It seems that if
you trick people into believing you're married then
you actually are.

Pennsylvania's is charmingly simple: "A common-law
marriage may be established if a man and woman
exchange words that indicate that they intend to be
married at the present time."

Texas' is stupid: "A man and woman who want to
establish a common-law marriage must sign a form
provided by the county clerk..." Why not just go
through the whole thing if you have to go to the
county clerk's office?

Some of them seem to specify man and woman, and I'd be
hard-pressed to imagine any of them would supersede or
loophole through a "defense of marriage" law, and I'd
think they wouldn't be necessary to establish a test
case either. Seems a lot easier to just schedule a
trip to Massachusetts some time after May 17th. I'd be
happy to serve as a witness or best man and I'd even
buy the first round afterwards.

Nate

--- Anne Gomez <annemgomez AT hotmail.com> wrote:
> Sorry, NC is not a common law marriage state (last I
> heard, there were only 
> 4 - one is SC; can't remember the others).