Canadians, Americans, Marriages, and Paperwork

[princesss]

Hey ladies, I have a quick question that hopefully has a quick answer.

One of my friends is expecting (eeeeee!) and she and her boyfriend are deciding whether or not to get married before or after the baby is born. They were planning on getting married anyways, though not formally engaged, and are just kind of exploring their options. Govt. websites being as confusing as they are, my friend (who is Canadian) is having trouble figuring out if she'll need to do any extra paperwork to marry an American. She's already got a green card and is working here, so that's not a problem - is there anything extra that she'll need to file, or can they just run off to Vegas (or her FIL's back yard since her FFIL is an ordained minister)?

 

[sunnyd]

Nope! All the state wants to see to get the marriage cert is a driver's license, so if she has that, that's all she needs.

Again. Haha.

 

[princesss]

Shhh! You're going to skew the results! Haha. Yeah, I think my friend is bad at research. Everything I've looked up says the same thing you did. Hopefully somebody (*cough*Gala*cough*) can back it up with personal experience with this whole inter-border thing.

In the meantime, I bow to your superior knowledge.

 

[sunnyd]

That's why I posted. It makes me sound smRter.

My SIL (Canuck) married an American, so I do know what I'm talking about!

 

[zipzapgirl]

I am an American who married a Canadian last year

All you have to do is get legally married in whichever state you want. The real paperwork comes later with the immigration authorities. You might want to consider having family members present so that you can answer affirmatively when the authorities ask if your parents were at the wedding, etc. to give you that extra "legitimacy" when you get to the interview process.

 

[Octavia]

If they want the baby's citizenship to be immediately clear (I imagine it will be dual Canadian/American), they should strongly consider getting married before it is born. It's been awhile since I had my immigration law class, but I know that when a child is born of an American father who is not married to its non-American mother, there are a lot of extra hoops to jump through in order to prove that the child should have US citizenship. It's not an issue when it's an American mother and a non-American father because there aren't really questions about who the "real" mom is in that situation. I wish I had the time to look up some of the rules for you right now, but in general, everything is much easier if the parents are married when the child is born. Just my $0.02!

 

[jjdav]

Hey ladies, I have a quick question that hopefully has a quick answer.

One of my friends is expecting (eeeeee!) and she and her boyfriend are deciding whether or not to get married before or after the baby is born. They were planning on getting married anyways, though not formally engaged, and are just kind of exploring their options. Govt. websites being as confusing as they are, my friend (who is Canadian) is having trouble figuring out if she'll need to do any extra paperwork to marry an American. She's already got a green card and is working here, so that's not a problem - is there anything extra that she'll need to file, or can they just run off to Vegas (or her FIL's back yard since her FFIL is an ordained minister)?

Congratulations to your friend on both counts! I'm an Australian who married an American last year and it should be as easy as getting the appropriate marriage license for the state they intend to get married in along with their IDs, driver's license will do. This is because your friend already has a green card, so immigration issues will not affect her wedding. I'm not too sure about the issue with the baby's citizenship, but presumably if he/she is born in the US, he/she will have a US birth certificate, that will make future paperwork processing (if any) a lot easier than a foreign birth.

Cheers

 

[Octavia]

by jjdav » 08 Jul 2010 06:08
Congratulations to your friend on both counts! I'm an Australian who married an American last year and it should be as easy as getting the appropriate marriage license for the state they intend to get married in along with their IDs, driver's license will do. This is because your friend already has a green card, so immigration issues will not affect her wedding. I'm not too sure about the issue with the baby's citizenship, but presumably if he/she is born in the US, he/she will have a US birth certificate, that will make future paperwork processing (if any) a lot easier than a foreign birth.

Cheers

Sorry, princesss, I'm an idiot and missed that your friend is already living and working in the US when I wrote my first post -- so that was based on the baby being born in Canada. Jjdav is right that it is much easier if the baby is born here! Sorry to be unnecessarily complicated...