Temple Square Salt Lake City

Archive for November 27th, 2009

Marriage is one of the few anticipated events that every couples are looking forward to. This is because, in this event, they would soon become husband and wife, and will share the rest of their lives together as one family. Marriage, in layman’s term, is the union of two people in a ceremony called a wedding. But in a more formal way, marriage is a social union or legal contract between individuals that creates kinship. It is an institution in which interpersonal relationships, usually intimate and sexual, are acknowledged by a variety of ways, depending on the culture or demographic. Marriage in Law Marriage in law is an institution known for its numerous restrictions and rules including age, race, sexual orientation, gender, social status. Restrictions are placed on marriage by society for reasons of benefiting the children, passing on healthy genes, to keep property concentrated, or because of prejudice and fear. Almost all cultures that recognize marriage also recognize adultery as a violation of the terms of marriage.

The United States has had a history of marriage restriction laws. Many states enacted miscegenation laws which were first introduced in the late seventeenth century in the slave-holding colonies of Virginia (1691) and Maryland (1692) and lasted until 1967 (until it was overturned via Loving v. Virginia). Many of these states restricted several minorities from marrying whites. For example, Alabama, Arkansas, and Oklahoma banned Blacks in particular.

States such as Mississippi and Missouri banned Blacks and Asians. States such as North Carolina and South Carolina banned Blacks and Native Americans, and some states such as Georgia, South Carolina, and Virginia banned all non-whites. Current federal law specifies marriage to be a union of one man and one woman. The 1996 Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) allows states to ignore same-sex unions from other states and bars the federal government from granting marriage benefits to couples in such unions. Opposition to the recognition of Deseret as a State by the Federal government was founded on opposition to the once-practised Polygamous marriages of Mormons. Societies have often placed restrictions on marriage to relatives, though the degree of prohibited relationship varies widely. In many societies, marriage between brothers and sisters has been forbidden. Roman law, for example, enforced marriage as a “union of man and woman and the inseparable association of their lives.” Some mainstream religions prohibit some marriages on the basis of the consanguinity (lineal descent) and affinity (kinship by marriage) of the prospective marriage partners, though the standards have varied and changed over time.  For more information visit to our site at http://philippineweddingplanner.com