Author: Karl Smallwood / Source: Today I Found Out
Wayne T. asks: What’s the deal with movies showing sea captains performing marriages? They can’t actually do this, right
According to countless movies and TV shows, sea captains, in addition to getting to wear dapper uniforms and snazzy hats, have the ability to marry couples aboard their ships thanks to the power bestowed upon them by… the sea we guess?
So can these captains actually perform marriages that are then legally binding?As in most things in life, particularly when the law is involved, it’s complicated. However, as a general rule, with a few exceptions like Japan, Bermuda, and Romania, sea captains do not have any inherent authority to officiate weddings where the couple will then be considered legally married.
(Japanese sea captains are given such authority, as long as they’re marrying two people who are also Japanese, and a similar thing is true in Romania, where interestingly Romanian law also gives aircraft captains the same power. Bermuda allows ship captains this same privilege, so long as the ship they’re captaining is registered in Bermuda. This was a not too subtle way to get more cruise ships to register their boats in Bermuda- and it totally worked, by the way.)
Despite this sort of authority not really being a thing in most regions, it is entirely possible, and not even terribly uncommon, for sea captains to marry couples. For example, one Captain Arnold Wonsever, working for Skyline Cruises in New York, noted he performs on average close to 200 weddings per year.
So how do all those sea captains who currently do it get around the legality problem, and where did the ubiquitous idea that such individuals had that authority come from in the first place?
To begin with, because there is such a common notion worldwide that sea captains are able to officiate legally binding marriages, some sea captains choose to go get the extra certification they’d need to do so. It’s simply a great way to make a little side money while otherwise performing their day job of captaining the ship. It’s also in some cases a way to get more people to come aboard your ship in the form of wedding parties.
Getting such certification isn’t difficult in many regions, such as in the United States where becoming ordained is absurdly easy, with various organizations offering this service online, in a few cases even for free.
Moving beyond the certified, some sea captains will simply officiate a wedding ceremony, but with it understood that said individual does not have the ability to sign off on things to make the marriage legally binding. However, there is even a caveat here in that, depending on where you’re from, it may be the case that declaring in front of witnesses that you’re marrying someone that you also then go and live with can qualify you for a common law marriage….
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