Joseph……….
My parents Z”L were married in NYC in 1944. They had an orthodox wedding but never got a marriage license. They filed joint income tax as husband and wife and owned joint property for the 65 years of their marriage.
After my father died, mom went to Social Security to get the widow’s benefit. She had been collecting CT teacher’s retirement on her own account since 1984 (public school teachers in CT are not covered by Social Security). At Social Security they demanded mom produce a certified copy of her marriage license in order to get the widow’s benefit.
After explaining for an hour that she and dad had a religious ceremony in NY and no marriage license, she was told that of she brought in her ketuba and if it was in both English and Hebrew it would satisfy the requirements. B”H my parents had both the hand calligraphy ketuba hanging on the dining room wall for 65 years and a small printed English Hebrew Ketubah that the hotel insisted the mesader kedushin fill out. That made it possible for mom to collect many thousands of dollars per year until she passed away.
I tell my family law clients to come in before marriage to set up trusts and/or prenuptial agreements to make sure to get, have filled out and recorded a marriage license form the state. It may be vital to your financial well being in years to come.