popa_bar_abba: In many if not most states, if you have a ceremonial marriage without a marriage license (or civil ceremony), your marriage is quite valid and you need a divorce to legally marry anyone else (though the clergy conducting the wedding may have to pay a fine for not checking on the license). People who have a frum wedding and act as if they aren’t married when dealing with the government could be prosecuted for fraud (if in doing so they avoid taxes and claim benefits)- though for most frum people they are better off with the married benefits.
