Kissing Cousins

While doing some wedding research on local Colorado wedding laws I was shocked and more than a little skeeved out to learn that first cousins could get married here. And even MORE shocked to learn that a total of 20 states allow first cousin marriage!!! So if you're a freak and live in Alabama, Alaska, California, Connecticut, D.C., Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Tennessee, Vermont or Virginia, then you need to look no further than the family Thanksgiving dinner table to find your spouse to be. I found many sites devoted to cousin love .... some as you can imagine were more than a bit disturbing :(

First cousin marriages are also allowed in Arizona, Illinois, Indiana, Utah and Wisconsin, but only if you're too old to have children (generally defined as being over 55 or 65 depending on the state) or unable to have children. The state of Maine is the lone state that allows first cousin marriage if you have a physician's certificate of genetic counseling.

So my internet tangent continued and I learned that all states allow second cousin marriages, and that Rudy Guiliani's first wife was his second cousin (found confirmation about this all over the internet). When he divorced her he used this fact to get an annulment from the Catholic Church because they had not gotten a dispensation prior to getting married.

Last interesting marriage fact is that in Colorado, you don't have to have an officiant for your wedding. As of August 1993, a couple can "solemnize" their own marriage. Basically you fill out a marriage license application, can then get a wedding certificate and sign that you solemized your own marriage. Also, both people don't have to be present at such event if one if sick, in jail or out of the country.Instead you can authorize a third person to be present in your place!!

edited to add: For the record, to my knowledge BJ and I are in NO WAY related to one another!!! ick!