Back to the role of advising future Brides and Bridegrooms and their parents about getting married in these United States:
So before you can get officially married, you must obtain a marriage license. A Marriage License requirement varies by State so for the state you are in, consult the web site of the State Clerk of Court for the requirements and the forms to be filled out.
Since we live in Texas we had to meet the requirements of the great State of Texas.
One of these is that the couple appear together at the County Clerk of Court to file the request for a Marriage License.Make sure you take cash since at least in Texas they do not accept checks or credit cards. The fee for a Marriage License is $67.00
The second major requirement is that there is a three day waiting period between when you get your marriage license and when you get married. Most of the time this is not a issue.
In my daughter's circumstances this became a problem. The groom was attending a Conference directly pertinent to his doctoral program being accompanied by his adviser and there was little chance for him to get out of this commitment.
The Law allows a Waiver of the three day waiting period. This Waiver though has to be signed by a District Court Judge on an approved form which you can get from the County Clerk of Court. This means you need to find out which county you live in, and where your Clerk of Court office is located. Happily many of the forms are available on-line these days. But please read the requirements carefully.
For instance on the bottom of one it is pre-printed "Texas Notary Public" which leads one to believe that only a Texas based Notary may notarize this document. Clearly this is hard to do if you are in a different state but in reality the document can be notarized anywhere in these United States or in a Consular Office overseas for that matter.
Another "gotcha" is that the "Waiver" form implies that the form has to be signed in front of the Judge, yet if you are going to be absent clearly you can not sign in front of the judge. The lack of the groom's signature almost derailed our plans but thanks to the Judge, he allowed us to fax the form to the groom and obtain his signature which he then could compare with the other signature to make sure it was the same person, and finally we got our waiver but not without some high anxiety.
And after the marriage ceremony is completed, someone, preferably someone reliable in the family must take the Marriage License to the County Clerk of Court Office and File it. After you have "filed" it, meaning "registered" that the marriage did indeed take place - which they verify from the signatures at the appropriate places - after a few days they will mail you the Marriage Certificate to the mailing address listed on the Marriage License.
