Reply #33: Then there is common-law marriage.

[Manifestor_of_Light]

In the common-law states, which are all Western, starting with Texas and going west, you can live together, cohabit, hold yourself out as husband and wife, and you have a common law marriage, assuming you have no prior impediments, such as a hubby or wife. You have to be single or officially divorced. There is no time limit on it, contrary to what most people think.

I had some in-laws once that were scared that my shackmate and I were going to wake up the morning six months after we moved in together and automatically be married. They were not lawyers and they believed that. I told them "Show me in the Texas Family Code where it says you are automatically married after six months." They couldn't, of course.

You can go down to the courthouse and register a common-law marriage in Texas. The western states also tend to have community property which means that the woman is presumed to be equal to the man in earning ability, and can own property in her own name when she is married, etc.

In Texas, we have valid case law stating a woman can own and transfer property in her own name dating back to 1836, the first year of the Republic of Texas. That is a far cry from Blackstone of England stating that in marriage, two people become one in a legal fiction, and that one person is the husband. English common law is also where the term "rule of thumb" comes from. :puke:

This comes from the Spanish law, which is far more equal to women than the English law of the northeast, or the Code Napoleon of Louisiana.

Yes, it is true that marriage is a civil contract, and nothing religious enters into it unless you want it to. That's why you can be married by a judge, starting with a J.P. and going all the way up the line, thru appellate judges.


Yes, I am a lawyer but I do not play one on TV.