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A courthouse ceremony: 10 to 15 minutes, but arrive half an hour early
The ceremony that legally makes you spouses can be grand, or it can be fifteen minutes inside a courthouse. This article covers the latter, plus a few things worth knowing whichever you choose.
There's no restriction on location
American law doesn't require a ceremony to be held anywhere in particular. A courthouse, a church, a beach, your own backyard: all fine. What decides whether a marriage exists is the officiant's qualification and whether the document went back to the county, not the location.
Many county clerks' offices offer a civil ceremony themselves, typically $25 to $100 (varying by county). Add the license fee and a courthouse wedding commonly lands between $50 and $300 all in.
Why arrive 30 minutes early
A courthouse isn't a wedding venue, it's a courthouse. You'll encounter:
- Security screening: airport-like, with a queue and a metal detector. Metal stems in a bouquet or a camera tripod can be stopped
- Finding the right office: large courthouses have several buildings and floors, and marriage business is often on some unremarkable one
- Parking: usually tight around a courthouse
And civil ceremonies run in time slots: arrive late and it's cancelled and rebooked. So half an hour early isn't conservative, it's necessary.
What you must bring on the day
- The original marriage license (if you didn't apply the same day at the same place)
- Both IDs
- A witness (if you have a public license, see item 7 of the checklist)
- Cash or a checkJust like applying for a license, many counties don't accept credit cards.
What to wear
Courthouses usually have no strict dress code, but being too casual (like shorts or flip-flops) can get you asked to change or reschedule. Dress as you would for an interview and you'll be fine. Many people wear a simple white dress or a suit. After all, the photos stay with you for a lifetime, so it's worth a little effort.
The common two-ceremony combination
A lot of couples marry legally at the courthouse first and hold a wedding for friends and family later. The advantages are practical:
- Immigration, insurance and tax timelines can start earlier instead of waiting for the wedding date
- On the wedding day you're not worrying about whether the license was signed and returned
- Destination weddings especially suit this, because a ceremony held abroad isn't automatically legally effective in the US (see item 124 of the checklist).
If you plan it this way, remember your legal marriage date is the courthouse date, and every later form uses that date, not the wedding day. Tell both families in advance so nobody ends up with a different idea of which day the anniversary is.
The ceremony ending isn't the end
Whether it's fifteen minutes at a courthouse or a wedding for three hundred, what actually determines whether the marriage exists after the ceremony is whether the officiant returned the signed license to the county within the deadline. For that step, see item 9 of the checklist, which is the place more people miss than anywhere else on this list.
In one line
The ceremony itself is fifteen minutes, but leave time for security and for finding your way; what actually marries you is the document that follows.