Senate Bill No. 302
(By Senators Boley, Minear, Buckalew, Love, Schoonover, Ross,
Sharpe)
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[Introduced March 12, 1997; referred to the Committee
on the Judiciary.]
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A BILL to amend and reenact section seventeen, article one,
chapter forty-eight of the code of West Virginia, one
thousand nine hundred thirty-one, as amended, relating to
validating foreign marriages except under certain
circumstances; and providing definition of "marriage" and
"spouse".
Be it enacted by the Legislature of West Virginia:
That section seventeen, article one, chapter forty-eight of
the code of West Virginia, one thousand nine hundred thirty-one,
as amended, be amended and reenacted to read as follows:
ARTICLE 1. MARRIAGE.
§48-1-17. Marriage out of state to evade law.
(a) A marriage solemnized in any other country, state, or territory, if valid where solemnized is valid here, unless it is
a marriage: (1) Where there is a husband or wife living, from
whom the person marrying has not been divorced; (2) where the
male or female is under fourteen years of age; (3) between
persons of the same sex; or (4) between parties who are related
to each other within and including three degrees of
consanguinity.
(b) "Marriage" means only a legal union between one man and
one woman as husband and wife, and "spouse" refers only to a
person of the opposite sex who is a husband or a wife.
NOTE: The purpose of this bill is to validate foreign
marriages with certain exceptions. It also defines "marriage"
and "spouse".
This section has been completely rewritten; therefore,
strike-throughs and underscoring have been omitted.