Re: A TEXAS BIGAMY DEFENSE

To: jfloyd@JohnTFloyd.com Hello there. Good work blogging on the FLDS cases. What do you think about this idea: Bigamy laws should be overturned because they violate Free Speech rights, namely the right to call your significant other a “wife” and the right to “purport” to be married. These are the acts that define common law bigamy in Texas — the expression of this thing called marriage, rather than any physical underlying actions or deception. Expression in it self, if harmless, should not be criminalized at all. Why is it that Texas has a law prohibiting “purporting” (making the expression) that one is married to multiple people? Carrying the defense into the realm of free speech, according the Tom Green ruling in Utah, also opens up the door to bringing a defense on the basis of vagueness, which is critical to defeating the nonsensical, circular bigamy statute. (I say it’s circular because it is: you are married if you purport to be married. That’s circular. It shouldn’t be allowed to be a valid legal definition.) What do you think about these ideas?

Thanks! Joey