Also, do you have proof that Sr's first marriage was still active in 1960/61? Or, are you assuming like most of us are?
Would be nice to have links / proof instead of hearsay.
Thanks.
From Wikipedia (I know, not the most reliable source, but I’m trying to locate the definitive common law and case law on the issue, as it’s been years since I read it in school):
Polygamy, in particular polygyny where one man takes several wives, is a common marriage pattern in some parts of the world. However, in the United States polygamy has never been a culturally normative or legally recognized institution. In Canada, polygamy laws are written in a slightly different way than in the USA. However, all provinces adhere to the federal Criminal Code of Canada which makes polygamy an offense and punishable by up to five years in prison.
Polygamy became a significant social and political issue in the United States in 1852, when The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) made it known that a form of the practice, called plural marriage, was part of its doctrine. Opposition to the practice by the United States government resulted in an intense legal conflict, and culminated in LDS Church president Wilford Woodruff announcing the church’s official abandonment of the practice on September 25, 1890.[1] However, breakaway Mormon fundamentalist groups living mostly in the western United States, Canada, and Mexico still practice plural marriage. A very small minority of American Muslims also practice polygamy.[2]
Bigamy is the act or condition of a person marrying another person while still being lawfully married to a second person and it is illegal in the United States. The crime is punishable either by a fine, imprisonment, or both, according to the law of the individual state and the circumstances of the offense.[4]
According to the Model Penal Code (section 230.1) bigamy is a misdemeanor, but having more than one spouse at the same time is a felony if it is done “in purported exercise of a plural marriage...” According to Joel Feinberg in Moral Limits of the Criminal Law, “Righteously flaunting one’s illicit relationships, according to the Code, is apparently a morally aggravating circumstance, more punishable than its clandestine and deceptive counterpart.”[5]
The Model Penal Code allows people to use an honest belief that they are only married to one person as a defense against a charge of bigamy. However, many US courts (e.g., Turner v. S., 212 Miss. 590, 55 So.2d 228) treat bigamy as a strict liability crime: in some jurisdictions a person can be convicted of a felony even if reasonably certain there was only one legal spouse. For example, if a person has the mistaken belief that their previous spouse is dead or that their divorce is final, they can still be convicted of bigamy if they marry a new person.[6]
See WND story on BHO Sr’s 1962 letter in the Hoover (Stanford) archive to Tom Mboya:
http://www.wnd.com/2010/11/226349/
“You know my wife is in Nairobi there and I would really appreciate any help you may give her.”
How could I prove I'm still married to me my wife? I could prove I wasn't if I had divorce papers, but how would I prove I am?
IOW, you are asking for something that does not exist.
Now they are likely documents tending to show that a marriage still exists, like joint tax returns, joint bank accounts, cencus records etc. Probably none of them, save maybe a cencus record, would apply in 1961 Kenya.
The guy was a Muslim, he could have just said "I divorce thee", three times, and he no longer be married to "that woman".