Today while I was reading and annotating a few in preparations for my International Private Law tutorial I was reminded about an original aim of the Grand Old Party. In the mid-1800s there was wide-spread public hostility towards the practice of polygamy, meaning being married to more than one person concurrently. Joseph Smith, the founder and prophet of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (Mormons), had a revelation in 1843 in which he called for men to marry more than one woman. Nine years later the Mormon Church officially announced polygamy was religiously superior to monogamy. Public outcry led to religious leaders, journalists and politicians denouncing the practice. The Republican Party, organized in Jackson, Michigan on 6 July 1854, had as their first national platform a denouncement of polygamy and slavery as “those twin relics of barbarism.”
The seminal case of polygamy came in England with Hyde v Hyde [1866] 1 LR-P & D, in which the Court declared marriage as being between one man and one woman. The leading American case is that of Reynolds v U.S. (1878) 98 US 145, in which the Supreme Court upheld the conviction of a Mormon leader for polygamy by rejecting the appellant’s claim to religious liberty as protected under the First Amendment of the US Constitution. In the UK most legal rights and privileges concerning married and cohabitating couples have been extended to same-sex couples by virtue of the Civil Partnership Act 2004. The concept of only two parties being privileged to a marriage or partnership was preserved. The common law in the UK has made special allowances for bigamy on a case by case basis.
The concept of bigamy (having two spouses) at common law was and is no different than that of polygamy. The U.S. Model Penal Code, s 230(1) classifies polygamy as a third-degree felony and the offence subsists until all cohabitation with and claim of marriage to more than one spouse terminates. Aliens from other jurisdictions visiting the US or the UK will not be any violation of criminal laws, so long as polygamy is lawful in the alien’s nation of origin.
The seminal case of polygamy came in England with Hyde v Hyde [1866] 1 LR-P & D, in which the Court declared marriage as being between one man and one woman. The leading American case is that of Reynolds v U.S. (1878) 98 US 145, in which the Supreme Court upheld the conviction of a Mormon leader for polygamy by rejecting the appellant’s claim to religious liberty as protected under the First Amendment of the US Constitution. In the UK most legal rights and privileges concerning married and cohabitating couples have been extended to same-sex couples by virtue of the Civil Partnership Act 2004. The concept of only two parties being privileged to a marriage or partnership was preserved. The common law in the UK has made special allowances for bigamy on a case by case basis.
The concept of bigamy (having two spouses) at common law was and is no different than that of polygamy. The U.S. Model Penal Code, s 230(1) classifies polygamy as a third-degree felony and the offence subsists until all cohabitation with and claim of marriage to more than one spouse terminates. Aliens from other jurisdictions visiting the US or the UK will not be any violation of criminal laws, so long as polygamy is lawful in the alien’s nation of origin.
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