The Christian missionaries came in and slowly implanted themselves on the land. Overriding any other system of belief until Christianity itself was the number one belief system in the new United States.
The states were encouraged to make their own Constitution on how they wanted to be treated.
"For three years, from 1778 to 1780, the political energies of Massachusetts were absorbed in drafting a charter of government that the voters would accept. One of the most contentious issues was whether the state would support the church financially. Advocating such a policy were the ministers and most members of the Congregational Church, which received public financial support, during the colonial period. The Baptists tenaciously adhered to their ancient conviction For three years, from 1778 to 1780, the political energies of Massachusetts were absorbed in drafting a charter of government that the voters would accept. One of the most contentious issues was whether the state would support the church financially. Advocating such a policy were the ministers and most members of the Congregational Church, which received public financial support, during the colonial period. The Baptists tenaciously adhered to their ancient conviction that churches should receive no support from the state.[citation needed] The Constitutional Convention chose to support the church and Article Three authorized a general religious tax to be directed to the church of a taxpayers' choice on needed] The Constitutional Convention chose to support the church and Article Three authorized a general religious tax to be directed to the church of a taxpayers' choice."
(Christianity in the United States, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christianity_in_the_United_States)
In 1801 Danbury Baptist wrote a letter to Thomas Jefferson contesting the fee they had to pay for Congregational support. They were residents of Connecticut. They did not want to support the Church.
In 1802, Thomas Jefferson responded to their letters summing up the First Amendment with the words we know now as separation of Church and State.
"Largely unknown in its day, this phrase has since become a major Constitutional issue. The first time the U.S. Supreme Court cited that phrase from Jefferson was in 1878, 76 years later."
(Christianity in the United States, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christianity_in_the_United_States)
There were different sects of Christianity that ended up on the shores of the new United States, but Catholicism held the majority of believers.
As we go through a time line of events such as:
"All states now granted married women the right to own property in their own name
•LDS Church President Joseph F. Smith issues the 1904 "Second Manefesto", which stated that the Church was no longer sanctioning plural (polygamous) Marriages and would excommunicated anyone who participates on future polygamy.
•1907 Under the Expatriation Act of 1907, American women will lose citizenship when they marry a foreign husband.
•1913 The federal government formally recognizes marriage law for the first time with the passage of the Revenue Act of 1913.
•1929 All states now have laws regarding marriage licenses."
(Timeline of civil marriages in the United States)
Let's stop here for a moment and look at what they proposed. Marriages were moving away from informal arrangements to civil codified documents.
In 1927, all states enacted their own laws for a marriage license. To show which states functioned under statutory law and which under common law, Geoffrey May LL.B, wrote a Manual called the, Marriage Laws And Decisions In The United States. In the Manual 49 states are covered.
"Statutory law is enacted by local law-making bodies, in the American states by the legislature. These laws are published after each legislative session in volumes commonly known as session laws. Periodically such session laws as are of general public nature are compiled by subjects into volumes known as Codes, Consolidated laws, Revised Statues, and the like. These Codes are in turn amended and supplemented by later session laws...Behind these statues and Independent of them is the common law.
In theory it is a universal concept (in English speaking countries) existing even as social relationshjps themselves exist. It is unwritten in a sense that any social systems is unwritten: the evidences , the interpretations of it alone are written. Such interpretations are expresses in decisions of courts on particular cases coming before them. They are an expression of the application of this body of the common law to the particular set of facts in litigation. The court decisions theoretically do not create the common law; they express it."
(Marriage Laws And Decisions In The United States: A Manuel, pgs. 5-6, Geoffrey May LL.B)
May is giving his reader a broad look at what common law is in a foundational sense.
Common law marriages have been around in the U.S., since 1629. Common law marriages are known as marriages that did not require a priest. It was simply a couple agreeing to be married and presenting themselves as such without a formal civil license or a religious ceremony. It was viewed as legally binding.
Common law marriages were still practiced among those who could not afford the marriage license. In 1639, Massachusetts is the first recorded state to issue a marriage license. Over the years other states would adopt the practice of using the marriage license.
In the 1900's, it was now common to issue out marriage licenses to couples. For the government it was now easy for them to keep track on the couple for census data and in order to enforce anti-miscegenation laws. A law against interracial marriages.
As of 2026, there are eight states and the District of D.C., that still recognize common law marriages, while there are 42 states that have abolished the practice of it completely. Those states are: Colorado, District of Columbia, Montana, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, Texas, Kansas, Iowa and Utah. The only restriction in Utah is that the couple has to petition the court to recognize their relationship, proving they lived together, mutually assumed martial rights, and acquired a general reputation as spouses. A petition needing to be filed for recognition while still in the relationship or a year after termination.
As we continue down the timeline:
"•1933- Married women granted right to citizenship independent of husband's
•1948- California Supreme Court overturns interracial marriage ban (Perez v. Sharp)
•1965- The Supreme Court overturns laws prohibiting married couples from using contraception ( Griswold v. Connecticut)
•1967- The Supreme Court overturns laws prohibiting interracial couples from marrying. ( Loving v. Virginia)" (Timeline of civil marriages in the United States)
Our focus of where we want to be lies between 1948 and 1967. This is where the true origin of the marriage license begins.
What makes me upset, while doing the research, is coming to the realization that when the Europeans and the traders came to America how easily and sufficient it was for them to marry into the Indigenous tribes here in America because it was about the outsiders assimilating into something that wasn't theirs, but once they got in they could claim as theirs. No one was hollering interracial marriage was wrong. But once they got there hands on all the land, integrated into the tribes pushing the true Indigenous ones off their land into subsections of land, then the states are keeping track of who is marrying who. Monitoring who can and can't marry. Stay within your race. This was not about supporting you in love. It was about control.
Andrea Perez and Sylvester D. Davis were a couple living in 1948, Los Angeles, California. Perez was Mexican who was classified as white, and Sylvester was a black man. They met working in the defense industry. Andrea and Sylvester decided they wanted to marry, and both being Catholic went to the priest and asked if the priest would do so. The Priest had no objection to it. They planned for a Catholic marriage with a Mass to take place.
Andrea and Sylvester went to the city clerk to apply for the marriage license, to be refused by W.G.S Sharp. The City Clerk. He refused to issue a marriage license according to the laws on the record, that,
"refused to issue the license based on California Civil Code, Section 60: "All marriages of white persons with Negroes, Mongolians, members of the Malay race, or mulattoes are illegal and void" and on Section 69, which stated that "no license may be issued authorizing the marriage of a white person with a Negro, mulatto, Mongolian or member of the Malay race". At the time, California's anti-miscegenation statute had banned interracial marriage since 1850, when it first enacted a statute prohibiting whites from marrying blacks or mulattoes."
(Wikipedia, Perez v. Sharp, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perez_v._Sharp)
Andrea and Sylvester sought out representation from Atty Daniel G. Marshall, who petitioned the court with a original writ of mandate, stating that the couple were both Catholic and wanted to get married.
"One of their primary arguments, adopted by Justice Douglas Edmonds in his concurring opinion, was that the Church was willing to marry them and so the state's anti-miscegenation law infringed on their right to participate fully in the sacraments of their religion, including the sacrament of matrimony."
(Wikipedia, Perez v. Sharp, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perez_v._Sharp)
The court voided the California Statue stating it was to vague, discriminating, and it went against the right to marry and the fourteenth amendment.
"The court held that marriage is a fundamental right and that laws restricting that right must not be based solely on prejudice. The lead opinion by Justice Roger Traynor and joined by Chief Justice Phil Gibson and Justice Jesse Carter, held that restrictions due to discrimination violated the constitutional requirements of due process and equal protection of the laws. The court voided the California statute, holding that Section 69 of the California Civil Code was too vague and uncertain to be enforceable restrictions on the fundamental right of marriage and that they violated the Fourteenth Amendment by impairing the right to marry on the basis of race alone. In a separate concurring opinion, Justice Douglas Edmonds held that the statute violated the religious freedom of the plaintiffs since the anti-miscegenation law infringed on their right to participate fully in the sacrament of matrimony.In a separate concurring opinion, Justice Carter wrote that the statutes under consideration were "the product of ignorance, prejudice and intolerance, that "never were constitutional" because when first enacted "they violated the supreme law of the land as found in the Declaration of Independence".
(Wikipedia, Perez v. Sharp, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perez_v._Sharp)
"In 2000, Alabama became the last state to repeal its interracial marriage ban when residents voted to remove an anti-miscegenation provision from the state constitution—more than 30 years after Loving made it unenforceable."
(https://calendar.eji.org/racial-injustice/may/05?fbclid=IwY2xjawTUcMhleHRuA2FlbQIxMQBzcnRjBmFwcF9pZA80MDk5NjI2MjMwODU2MDkAAR60scjM7WkIS1EkuA0znv9jIYu9T5aXTkuHhNih5c4xbpWa8SM18zRAmOpD1g_aem_UIE5w0GHpdiFj2Jzu_UDYw)
Andrea and Sylvester won their case, and were married until Andrea passed in 2000.
Anti-miscegenation laws go back farther before Perez v. Sharp. In 1881, Tony Pace, a black man, and Mary Cox, were arrested because their sexual relationship violated the anti-miscegenation laws of Alabama. They were charged for living together in a state of fornication, and sentenced to 2 years in the penitentiary.
"Tony Pace, an African-American man, and Mary Cox, a white woman, were residents of the state of Alabama, who had been arrested in 1881 because their sexual relationship violated the state's anti-miscegenation statute. They were charged with living together "in a state of adultery or fornication" and both sentenced to two years imprisonment in the state penitentiary in 1882."
(Wikipedia, Pace v. Alabama, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pace_v._Alabama)
Pace and Cox being an interracial couple under anti-miscegenation laws would not have been able to marry. Anti-miscegenation laws were to govern interracial married couples, but Alabama chose to have it cover interracial couples regardless of martial statues. It was damn if you do. Damn if you don't. Pace and Cox, were not married, and did not live with another. They stayed in close proximity, but in Alabama, that had consequences.
"Interracial marital sex was deemed a felony, whereas extramarital sex ("adultery or fornication") was only a misdemeanor.Because of the criminalization of interracial relationships, they were penalized more severely for their extramarital relationship than if they had been of the same race. The Alabama code stated:If any white person and any negro, or the descendant of any negro to the third generation, inclusive, though one ancestor of each generation was a white person, intermarry or live in adultery or fornication with each other, each of them must, on conviction, be imprisoned in the penitentiary or sentenced to hard labor for the county for not less than two nor more than seven years."
(Wikipedia, Pace v. Alabama, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pace_v._Alabama)
In the appeal to the state Supreme Court, Cox argued that her cased should be squashed because they had her middle name listed as Ann and not Jane when they indicted her. That effect failed, because they essentially said, your first and last name is correct irregardless if your middle name is Ann or Jane. We got who we want.
"Cox argued to the state Supreme Court that her indictment should be quashed on the basis that she had been charged and indicted under the name "Mary Ann Cox", but her name was in fact, "Mary Jane Cox". The Alabama Supreme Court rejected this argument and upheld the indictment:"The law knows but one Christian name, and the insertion or omission of a defendant's middle name in an indictment is entirely immaterial; and a mistake in the middle name will not support a plea of misnomer."
(Wikipedia, Pace v. Alabama, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pace_v._Alabama)
Pace received an appeal from the Supreme Court of the state. His judgement being affirmed based on,
"insisting that the act which he was indicted and convicted under conflicted with the final clause of the first section of the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution, which declares that no state shall deny to any person the equal protection of the laws."
(Wikipedia, Pace v. Alabama, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pace_v._Alabama)
The Alabama Supreme Court saying that the arrest and punishment was not based on race or color,but for the offense. They viewed it as a evil tendency that would have been greater in that relationship, then in one if both parties were of the same race. To sum it up, they were saying, without trying not to say it, that,
"it could lead to “a mongrel population and a degraded civilization.” The true severity of their offense did not really stem from the interracial relationship, but instead that the fornication could end in an amalgamation, or, simply, a mixed-race child."
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pace_v._Alabama)
Anti-miscegenation laws were Federally enacted. The states were codifying a marriage license as mandatory. The 1920's were known as the Eugenics Era. In 1924, Virginia, The Racial Integrity Act was formed. The Act specified the definition of a white person, and prohibited interracial marriages. In 1926, segregation happened under the Public Assemblage Act, and in 1930, defined what a black person was. Because of the Racial Integrity Act is where the one drop rule came from. Distinguishing bloodlines through man-made Acts and prejudices.
Before Perez v. Sharp, California enacted a statute that race be stamped on marriage applications in 1943.
"California had banned interracial marriage between white and Black people since first achieving statehood in 1850. A law passed that year declared that, “all marriages of whites with negroes or mulattoes are declared to be null and void.” California later expanded the law to also ban white people from marrying people defined as "mongolian" or “malay” in response to a subsequent increase in immigration from Asia. The state’s white community widely supported the enactment of these policies and the officials who passed them...The California Supreme Court struck down both the 1943 statute requiring race on marriage licenses and the state's much older ban on interracial marriage on October 1, 1948."
(To Prevent Interracial Marriage, California Requires That Marriage Licenses Indicate Race,https://calendar.eji.org/racial-injustice/may/5)
The mandatory licenses created in each state was used to track interracial couples seeking to marry, and to stop the process in its tracks by denying them the opportunity to marry. To make it look like it was for the benefit of everyone, and, not racial profiling everyone wanting to marry, was encouraged to apply. It was the perfect paper trail.
1n 1965, Women were legally denied birth control if they were single. Married women had no problems being prescribed the pill. But that wasn't always the case until Dr. Estelle Griswold and Dr. Lee Buxton were arrested for counseling married couples about conception.
"a Connecticut law prohibited the use of “any drug, medicinal article or instrument for the purpose of preventing conception” and punished anyone who “assists, abets, counsels, causes, hires or commands another” to do so. Put simply, it wasn’t a crime to sell birth control devices, but it was a crime to use birth control or any drug or medical instrument to prevent pregnancy or help anyone else use birth control. Griswold and Buxton were clearly in violation of the law."
(Griswold v. Connecticut Case Summary, https://supreme.findlaw.com/supreme-court-insights/griswold-v-connecticut-case-summary.html)
This during a time when the Comstock Laws were still in effect. They sued stating the law violated their constitutional rights, and that couples had a right to privacy.
"the Court decided that the state law against contraceptives violated a “zone of privacy” inherent in the Constitution. Notably, the Court found constitutional protection emitting from “penumbras,” or shadows, within several amendments to the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.As the majority opinion put it,“. . . specific guarantees in the Bill of Rights have penumbras, formed by emanations from those guarantees that help give them life and substance.” According to the Court, one of these guarantees is a certain measure of privacy and liberty from government control over private life and beliefs.In describing this right to privacy, the Court pointed to the First, Third, Fourth, and Fifth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution. The First Amendment gives a right to free speech and freedom of religion. The Third prohibits the government from stationing troops in homes. The Fourth prohibits the government from conducting unreasonable searches and seizures. The Fifth, meanwhile, allows citizens to avoid incriminating themselves under oath."
Single women were not apart of this equation. The Supreme Court based its decision solely on the autonomy of a married couple under zone of privacy, not under individual autonomy.
William Baird, a birth control advocate, was in agreement that women should have to deal with their bodies in the way they saw fit. Baird gave a lecture at Boston University in April 1965, on contraception and overpopulation. After the lecture he gave a 19 year old student contraceptives. Baird was arrested by Boston Police on the spot. He was sentenced to 3 months in the house of corrections. Baird would take this matter to the Supreme Court in 1972, Eisenstadt v. Baird. It was ruled that the right of a person belongs to the individual.
Birth control to unmarried women brought in fear of an increase in premarital sex,the breakdown of the traditional family unit. During this time under the Tenth amendment states held police powers that gave them access to regulate public health, safety, and morals.
"In United States constitutional law, the police power is the authority of the U.S. states to pass laws regulating behavior and enforcing order within their territory for the betterment of the health, safety, morals, and general welfare of their inhabitants. Police power is defined in each jurisdiction by the legislative body, which determines the public purposes that need to be served by legislation. Under the Tenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, the powers not delegated to the federal government are reserved to the states or to the people. As a result, the police power primarily belongs to state governments, although the U.S. federal government possesses it in limited contexts where it has an express power, such as over conduct occurring within the territories of the United States and activities related to interstate commerce."
(Police power United States Constitutional Law, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Police_power_(United_States_constitutional_law)
By legalizing contraception only for married couples, the Supreme Court allowed states to keep using their police powers to regulate the sexual behavior of unmarried citizens.
Mildred Jeter, a black woman, and Richard Loving, a white man who resided in Virginia wanted to get married. Because of Virginia's 1924 Racial Integrity Act, that had to leave Virginia to go to Washington D.C., in order to marry.
"June, 1958, two residents of Virginia, Mildred Jeter, a Negro woman, and Richard Loving, a white man, were married in the District of Columbia pursuant to its laws. Shortly after their marriage, the Lovings returned to Virginia and established their marital abode in Caroline County. At the October Term, 1958, of the Circuit Court of Caroline County, a grand jury issued an indictment charging the Lovings with violating Virginia's ban on interracial marriages. On January 6, 1959, the Lovings pleaded guilty to the charge, and were sentenced to one year in jail; however, the trial judge suspended the sentence for a period of 25 years on the condition that the Lovings leave the State and not return to Virginia together for 25 years. He stated in an opinion that:"Almighty God created the races white, black, yellow, malay and red, and he placed them on separate continents. And, but for the interference with his arrangement, there would be no cause for such marriage. The fact that he separated the races shows that he did not intend for the races to mix."
( Justia, Loving v. Virginia, 388 U.S. 1 (1967), https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/388/1/)
The Lovings moved to Washington D.C. They began to miss living in Virigina, and in 1964, contacted the ACLU. Their Attorney General was Robert F. Kennedy. The Lovings also filed their case with the Federal Court. The Supreme Court heard their case modifying the sentence but confirming their conviction.
"Justice Warren did not accept Virginia's argument that placing equal penalties on spouses of each race made the law non-discriminatory. He pointed out that the law did not criminalize marriage between persons of two non-white races, which suggested that it had a white supremacist motivation. There was no other legitimate purpose that could justify this law or any others like it, Warren held, since it infringed upon the fundamental right of marriage.Concurrence• Potter Stewart (Author)Largely echoing Warren's reasoning, Stewart simply wrote an additional opinion as a reminder that he had advocated striking down anti-miscegenation laws in an earlier opnion from the case of McLaughlin v. Florida."
(Justia, Loving v. Virginia, 388 U.S. 1 (1967), https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/388/1/)
Loving v. Virginia would open the way to Obergefell v. Hodges, that would pass a 5-4 vote, passing marriage between those of the same sex. It was in 1971 that the Supreme Court refused to hear the challenge to a Minnesota Supreme Court ruling allowing prohibition of same-sex marriage. It would be in 1973 that Maryland would become the first state to define marriage as being between a man and a woman.
Conclusion
From the Annunaki to Sumeria and Egypt women were married through consent and consummation. The Church slowly making its appearance known in Rome where most of our modern day marriage traditions started. Same-sex relationships were not frowned upon, but marriage was not acknowledged if done. Leading us to Turtle Island with the Chahta and the Cherokees. Marriage was familial, ancient without the process of priest, and licenses until after the Europeans arrival and the state's were requested to make their own Constitutions for their state, which lead to each state creating their own laws.
Laws were created. Statues were created. Marriage Licenses were set in place. A couple now had to apply for a license to get married.
License: "a formal, legal permission granted by an authoritative body to do, use, or own something that would otherwise be illegal, restricted, or unauthorized." (Barneswalker.com)
Essentially, one is asking a governmental body for permission to marry. Something that outside of it would be viewed as illegal. Wouldn't that be against the 14th Amendment? The set-up for the marriage license that was purely created to patrol, track, and monetarily line the pockets of each state? We could theorically apply this license to everything. Drivers license, Medical license, Law license, Real Estate license, etc.
Marriage was about love, consent between the parties wanting to marry and consummating the relationship.
As time has gone on and certain fights have been won, marriage since 1929 requires a marriage license. Except for Alabama, where in 2019, the marriage license was repealed. Those that look to get married no longer require a marriage license. Instead, the couple fills out the marriage license, gets it notarized by two notaries and submits it to the Alabama judge who is required to accept the certificate.
According to Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, some states are making digital updates to how the marriage license is handled. Alabama, Arizona, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, New Mexico, New York, and Utah, have made it easier for couples to obtain, complete, and submit a marriage license application online, as well as to go online to request a certified copy of a marriage certificate. They don't require applicants to appear in person to obtain a license, allowing officiants to sign marriage certificates electronically, and delivering marriage certificates electronically. In Colorado and Pennsylvania a couple can self marry without an officiant or priest. States still only recognize a two person marriage. It considers polygamy, bigamy.
There are couples who would like to marry, but don't want to deal with the laws, of getting married. Through my research, there is paperwork one can fill out that would help legally cover them.
There are ceremonies called, Commitment Ceremonies/ Private Marriages, where the couple can still have a wedding, but the officiant doesn't file paperwork with the state. In the eyes of family, friends, you are married. This relates back to how couples consented to be married, but with the state you are still considered legally single. Because a marriage license was not signed family courts have no jurisdiction over you.
If you want to make sure that you and your partner can take care of one another in case of an emergency, it overrides blood relatives, these two forms are the most important.
Medical Power of Attorney - This form gives your paper consent to make decisions on your behalf in case of a medical emergency, illness or unable to speak for yourself. Giving you the protection making you seen as your partners, immediate family. It covers hospital visitation, medical decisions, and you can stipulate your end of life choices into the document.
Durable Financial Power of Attorney - Must state its durable to give your partner access to act on your behalf if you are cognitively injured.
Living Will (Advance Directive)- This document is to state your end of life wishes. (Life support, whether or not to resuscitate).
HIPAA Release Form-This document authorizes doctors to release and share your charts and medical conditions.
Under state law if you don't possess these next forms and your partner passes away, anything such as homes, bank accounts, 401k, investments will roll over to parents or siblings. Leaving you with nothing.
Last Will and Testament-Explicitly names your partner to inherit your belongings (house,car, beneficiary.
Revocable Living Trust- Document to pass large investments to your partner, like a home.
Transfer-On-Death/ Payment-On-Death- Free files you file with your bank, 401k, investment firms naming your partner as beneficary.
These documents bypass a prenuptial for those doing a Private Marriage.
Cohabitation Agreement - contract dealing with how rent/mortgage is dealt with, exactly how these assets are divided and who ends up with what on a break up and who owns household items.
Family LLC Operating Agreement- Used if you buy a home or run a business together. The LLC owns the property and operating agreement, while the partners financial shares and buyout terms are defined.
Tenancy In Common Deed- Real estate deed you use if you don't go the way of the Family LLC Operating Agreement. It outlines the percentage of property each person gets.
The last forms are the Child/Parenting Forms, if needed.
Co-Parenting Agreement- Financial responsibilities if the relationship ends, joint parenting conditions, custody expectations.
Delegation of Parental Powers ( Minor Medical POA)- It temporarily grants a non- biological parent legal authority to sign for a child's medical treatments, school enrollment and field trips.
To make this legal print the forms according to your state. Sign them in front of a notary along with two witnesses. Submit a copy to your primary care doctor, if you have one, keep your originals in a safe place.
There is a company that assist in giving everything needed for this process I found online called, Deep Sea Royalty, that offers a Premium Divine Law Covenant Bundle for those choosing the Private Marriage route. They say that the bundle, "was created with one divine intention: to restore to covenant, and protection to unions that choose to stand under Divine Law rather than solely under the systems of men."
The company is leaning back on ancient principles that have been shown here in this blog. Because in 2026, 49 states live under the statues of a marriage license, not divine law, and couples have to cover themselves accordingly.
I came across the following video that basically sums up everything that I have written through this blog starting from Rome and the Church making its why over to Turtle Island up to the present moment. I didn't go looking for this. It found me, and I think it's worth a listen.
For those who aren't able to view the video or would rather read the transcription, here it is.
