[BikerNYC]

And I can do all that by Church and Private Contract, without any need for the thrice-damned "Government Marriage License"

Then why get one of those nasty little government marriage licenses? As you say, you don't need it to live a good and moral life, bound to your betrothed in the eyes of the OPC.

Is it that the license gives you certain perks which are not necessarily connected to the religious aspects of your private marriage that you find.....let us say....valuable?

[OrthodoxPresbyterian]

Then why get one of those nasty little government marriage licenses? As you say, you don't need it to live a good and moral life, bound to your betrothed in the eyes of the OPC. Is it that the license gives you certain perks which are not necessarily connected to the religious aspects of your private marriage that you find.....let us say....valuable?

No, the problem here is that so long as the State usurps to itself the authority to define and authorize the Legal constitution of a "Marriage", private Life-Partnership contracts are viewed as subordinate to the State's Rules of the Game. For example, Pre-Nuptial Agreements are a private-market response to the failures of State Marriage Law -- but the State still reserves to itself the authority to re-write or dismiss Pre-Nuptial Agreements which it considers "unfair". (In fact, I don't believe that a Nuptial Agreement would even be considered a Valid Contract by the State, without an accompanying Government Marriage License).

Ergo, there is no intrinsic "value" that Government Marriage Licenses "provide" which could not be better provided by Private Market contracts, except that the State has essentially monopolized unto itself the Contractual nature of Marriage by abrogating the natural authority of Private Nuptial Contracts. Thus, in order to enjoy any legally-valid contractual protection of one's marital station, it becomes necessary to comply with Government Marriage Licensing -- not because the State provides a "value" which the Private Market could not, but because the State has made itself the Only Game in Town.