
Married in Montana: Servicemembers take advantage of state’s double-proxy law - wglb
https://www.stripes.com/news/married-in-montana-servicemembers-take-advantage-of-state-s-double-proxy-law-1.91942
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xxpor
Montana is an interesting state in general when it comes to laws.

It's the only state where an engagement ring is an unconditional gift, for
example. Every other state the giver can sue the receiver to recover the ring
if the engagement is broken off.

Another example is that Montana is one of a few (the only?) state that doesn't
have at-will employment. After a probationary period, if you fire someone it
needs to be for cause.

~~~
trendia
> the giver can sue the receiver to recover the ring if the engagement is
> broken off.

Which contradicts the whole idea of an engagement ring:

> In the United States, until the Great Depression, a man who broke off a
> marriage engagement could be sued for breach of promise. Monetary damages
> included actual expenses incurred in preparing for the wedding, plus damages
> for emotional distress and loss of other marriage prospects. Damages were
> greatly increased if the woman had engaged in sexual intercourse with her
> fiancé.[32] Beginning in 1935, these laws were repealed or limited. However,
> the social and financial cost of a broken engagement was no less: marriage
> was the only financially sound option for most women, and if she was no
> longer a virgin, her prospects for a suitable future marriage were greatly
> decreased. The diamond engagement ring thus became a source of financial
> security for the woman.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Engagement_ring#Purchase](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Engagement_ring#Purchase)

~~~
DoreenMichele
So, we are celebrating women as chattel property who need to preserve their
virginity to enhance their capacity to marry well. In 2018.

Your comment is making me feel vastly better about never having had an
engagement ring, though I got married at age 19 and spent about 2 decades as a
homemaker in a 1950s style marriage.

(Edit: I'm a woman, in case that actually needs to be said.)

~~~
jfoutz
Perhaps the poster was celebrating women as chattel property. I don't know. I
thought it was an interesting fact. It's weird more states haven't determined
an engagement ring is simply a gift, and not a sort of (as i learned today
from the poster's comment) bizarre form of insurance policy.

~~~
DoreenMichele
It is interesting historical information. Except for the introductory
statement "Which contradicts the whole idea of an engagement ring" which
essentially asserts an expectation that we should accept this historical
practice as the correct basis of laws today.

I'm currently 53. When I was 19 or 20, I had a college classmate in her 70s
iirc who talked about legally needing her husband's written permission to even
get a job when she was in her twenties. This was the degree to which women
were treated as property. So, yes, around 80 years ago, marrying well was just
about the only hope of financial solvency a woman had.

I'm a former homemaker. I raised two special needs kids and followed my
husband's military career around the world. Between that and a serious medical
crisis, I've been really dirt poor for years and spent some years homeless.

So I think quite a lot about the degree to which society and husbands really
ought to compensate women more for their labor and personal sacrifices in
raising kids and supporting male careers at the expense of their own.

But policies are always two edged swords. Given how incredibly poor I have
been, I am incredibly leery of the existence of actual _laws_ still on the
books that are rooted in the historical artifact of treating women literally
as property of their husbands, even if that law is supposedly in the interest
of the woman who is otherwise expected to accept being treated as a man's
possession.

I have worked hard to try to find my voice in a world that is often openly
hostile towards a former homemaker and her views being treated like a real
person. I get crapped on a lot by self-proclaimed feminists who are often
childless career women who seem to not actually be happy with their lives and
are taking it out on me for various reasons.

The world needs very much to find a way to help people both stay home to care
for children when that is the right answer for the family and also help them
get a real career afterwards when that time has passed. The law in question is
part of the manacles that keep women oppressed and poverty-stricken.

Please note I was careful to not attack the GGP. I just commented that it made
me feel better about a detail of my life that I occasionally lament as
evidence of a lack of "romance" in my life. I had something better than
romance. I had a husband who genuinely cared about my welfare, something that
is typically lacking in marriages based on the idea that he basically bought
her because he has money, even if it isn't as explicit as such arrangements
once commonly were.

The engagement ring laws cited are part of a polite form of selling oneself
into slavery. It should be ancient history, but in 49 states, it is still the
law.

~~~
UncleEntity
> So I think quite a lot about the degree to which society and husbands really
> ought to compensate women more for their labor and personal sacrifices in
> raising kids and supporting male careers at the expense of their own.

Isn't that the whole idea behind alimony? Assuming the marriage ends
prematurely (i.e. not "till death do us part") and speaking of the husband's
responsibility in the matter.

As to society's responsibility in this matter, women have 100% the same rights
as men in this day and age (well, other than the "right" to be conscripted) so
at some point people just need to accept that choices they make in life will
have certain drawbacks and/or advantages which may or may not affect their
future in positive and/or negative ways. I'm also roughly the same age as you
so I know there really weren't "manacles that keep women oppressed and
poverty-stricken" in our lifetime and in fact the plight of women has arguably
been the best it has ever been in all of human history. I'd even go as far as
say it's The Golden Age of Womendom. Though, admittedly, things were a bit
different pre-90's with regards to single mothers and, umm, "non-traditional"
gender roles, probably more so if you didn't have the "luck" of growing up a
major metropolitan area I'd imagine.

Please don't take what I'm saying as a personal attack but merely as an
opposing viewpoint because I know these subjects get kind of touchy these
days.

~~~
DoreenMichele
The problem is that women still get pregnant, women still lactate and men do
not (people looking for BS excuses to attack me can spare me their rant about
how that statement makes me transphobic, thanks -- there are far better ways
to advocate for trans rights than randomly pissing on people). This is further
compounded by a raft load of social norms that I see as ultimately rooted in
that fundamental reality.

I'm not interested in fighting with you, but when you outright dismiss my
assertion that women remain oppressed, it's really not fertile ground for
having a good discussion on the topic. I'm not having a good day to begin with
and your comment just reminds me of comments on HN where people try to dismiss
the idea that my gender is a serious barrier to financial connections on HN
and my rebuttal to that is that I appear to be the only woman to have ever
been on the leaderboard and then that gets attacked as irrelevant and it's a
really crazy making thing for me.

A lot of men on the leaderboard are quite well heeled. Some of that money
clearly comes from their connections here on HN. These conversations make fire
coming shooting out my ears and that's not a good place from which to try to
engage in civil discourse in accordance with HN guidelines.

------
tomohawk
> afford dream wedding

So many people make this mistake. Instead of splurging on a really big
wedding, put the money into something that is actually going to benefit you
and your relationship.

~~~
enobrev
Throwing a pig roast for 150 inebriated friends benefitted myself and my
relationship immensely

~~~
astura
I believe the criticism is directed towards the wedding industry that
manipulates emotions to make the hard sell. The modern wedding is mostly a
consumer product. Like all consumer products, it can certainly be very
enjoyable if you like that sort of thing!

I also believe the criticism is directed towards people who concentrate their
efforts on the wedding to the detriment of the actual marriage.

------
dmckeon
1) Doesn't the US military have chaplains who could perform marriages? Why
don't they?

2) What additional value does a married service member provide to the taxpayer
that is worth an additional $40/day over what an unmarried service member
provides?

~~~
torstenvl
1) I don't understand the thought process behind this question. Having the
title "chaplain" doesn't magically confer teleportation abilities.

2) This is the wrong frame of mind. The answer is zero. There is zero
articulable additional benefit for a service member to be married. It is a
worthwhile expense anyway.

~~~
RangerScience
> 2) This is the wrong frame of mind. The answer is zero.

What? That doesn't make sense. At a glance, otherwise, what's the point of
marriage versus civil unions? I'm assuming here, and could be wrong, that
there's no legal difference - but people still fight for marriage when they
can only have civil unions.

Even if you got rid of all the legal and pay advantages to marriage, people
still find it valuable and enriching. It may be an ephemeral benefit, but it's
still articulable.

~~~
loeg
> what's the point of marriage versus civil unions? I'm assuming here, and
> could be wrong, that there's no legal difference

Yep, there are/where legal distinctions (sort of irrelevant now in the US with
federalized same-sex marriage).
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_union#United_States](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_union#United_States)
. The main problem is that unlike marriages, there is no requirement that
states recognize civil unions granted in other states, because:

> The federal government does not recognize these unions.

Not a _direct_ legal distinction, but:

> Civil unions are commonly criticised as being 'separate but equal', critics
> say they segregate same-sex couples by forcing them to use a separate
> institution.

~~~
RangerScience
Did not know that it wasn't a federal thing! Thanks for teaching me.

And yeah, my point is about the "separate but equal" sort of thing - it's not
a legal distinction, but it's one people definitely care about.

------
cimmanom
That's awesome that such a thing is available to members of the military who
need it. Seems to me like the sort of thing that could be ripe for abuse,
though. I wonder if anyone's ever been married by proxy without their
knowledge or consent?

~~~
fjsolwmv
How would a fraudulent proxy marriage be more likely than just making a fraud
in-person marriage? Once falsifying paperwork is on the table, the rest is
easy.

------
loeg
> With the extra money the Army will pay him now that he’s married — an
> estimated $1,200 to $1,400 a month

Anyone know what/how this is? Is this just blatant discrimination against
unmarried servicemembers, or what?

~~~
camhenlin
Yes, I served in the Marines for 4 years and I experienced this firsthand.
Unmarried service members often times get the short end of the stick: less pay
(if married, you get extra money for housing and food, and separation
allowance if you don’t live with your spouse), crappier or more duties (hey!
Give the unmarried people stuff to do after normal work, they have no spouse
to go home to!), and more. This leads to a whole set of issues: people -
especially junior service members - get “contract marriages” where they get
married just for the extra benefits money and benefits, which leads to a high
divorce rate, and people getting charged under the UCMJ for cheating on their
“spouses”. It’s dumb and insane and people should all be paid the same and
receive the same benefits

------
mamurphy
>A Montana double-proxy marriage is considered legal in all 50 states except
Iowa and is recognized by the U.S. military.

What's up with Iowa? Also, what happened to the full faith and credit clause
of the Constitution, requiring, among other things, marriages in one state to
be recognized by another state.

~~~
astura
According to one of the proxy marriage sites:

>To be recognized as legally valid pursuant to Iowa State Law, marriages,
which are originated via proxy, must be further perfected; moreover,
additional processing is required. Please inform us if you will need your
proxy marriage to be recognized under Iowa State Law.

~~~
CamTin
Doesn't Article IV, Section 1 of the U.S. Constitution (the "full faith and
credit clause") pretty much require Iowa to accept a Montana wedding
certificate at face value?

~~~
astura
I would think so.

------
njarboe
"With the extra money the Army will pay him now that he’s married — an
estimated $1,200 to $1,400 a month — the Bakers will be able to afford their
dream wedding this fall, he said."

Seems a bit out of step with the current American zeitgeist.

