Outdated Immigration Laws Keep Families Apart

In America we give a lot of credence to tradition and history. After all, learning from our past should be the way to improve our future. But the problem is that sometimes we forget to learn and repeat the same mistakes. For example U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services cannot recognize a proxy marriage unless the marriage was consummated after the marriage takes place. USCIS takes this position based on a piece of legislation written in the 1950s. Proxy marriages are common place in the U.S. military and they allow couples who are physically separated to marry each other. So unless the proxy marriage is consummated after the date, U.S. immigration will not recognize the marriage and will not issue a marriage based immigrant visa to the foreign national spouse. Such conflict of law issues should be a focus for the new administration when immigration reform is put back on the agenda in 2010.  Source: