No birth certificate, no marriage

Last year, an organization known as the Louisiana Family Forum lobbied Louisiana legislators for a bill that would curb a supposed epidemic of “marriage fraud”.  A state representative, Valarie Hodges, obliged and introduced the bill to the state legislature. Both claim to be a voice for “traditional families” amid the country’s latest wave of nativism. The bill became law and received little attention when it went into effect in January 2016. The little-noticed new state law has effectively made it illegal for thousands of refugees to get married. So, as of this year, any foreign-born person wanting to get married in Louisiana must produce both an unexpired visa (even though a federal court has ruled that marriage licenses cannot be denied based on immigration status), as well as, somewhat inexplicably, a birth certificate.

No birth certificate, no marriage, no excuses.
The law has indeed placed marriage off-limits to immigrants in the country illegally, as intended. But it’s hurt plenty of legal immigrants, too. Louisiana is home to thousands of refugees, predominantly Vietnamese and Laotians who received asylum in the 1970s and 1980s after fleeing war and communism in their homelands. Today these Louisianans often have green cards and even U.S. citizenship, but no access to their original birth documents, if such documents even exist. Apparently, the state’s religious right decided that the sacred institution of wedlock was once again under attack — this time, by devious immigrants.

Undocumented workers and even terrorists had newly discovered they could exploit Louisiana’s marriage laws to gain citizenship, legislators claimed, leading to a supposed epidemic of “marriage fraud.”

The response?   Make it more difficult for immigrants to get married, of course. It’s not clear whether the champions of the Louisiana law intended to make marriage less accessible, or if they’re merely indifferent to an unintended consequence of their anti-immigrant reflexes.

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