Same-sex couples from Wisconsin who marry in California can face nine months in jail and a $10,000 fine on returning home, CNN reported last Tuesday.
The penalty, based on a 1915 law originally enacted to prevent interracial marriages performed in other states, is being revived to persecute same-sex couples who tie the knot in California. "If you leave the state to get married with the intent of coming back to the state, you can be subject to imprisonment for nine months and up to a $10,000 fine," Glenn Carlson of the LGBT advocacy group Fair Wisconsin told CNN in a video interview.
The Wisconsin law states that "if any person residing and intending to continue to reside in this state who is disabled or prohibited from contracting marriage under the laws of this state goes into another state or country and there contracts a marriage prohibited or declared void under the laws of this state, such marriage shall be void for all purposes in this state with the same effect as though it had been entered into in this state."
However, not only will the marriage be void, but couples can also be punished to the full extent of the law.
The penalties sound fair to Julaine Appling of the Wisconsin Family Council. Appling told CNN that same-sex couples who break the Wisconsin law should be charged with fraud. "It's a defrauding of the government," she said. (The Advocate)
