Yes, please - the more details, the better!
Nope. see the marriage licence, on page 2:
Dunno why the difference. Maybe because death is more certain, while being divorced is a legal state?
Well, I’m sure the stories in your head are much more entertaining than reality was! Still, best I can remember and details changed to protect the guilty and embarrassed…
Daddy was upset that his little girl was not really his little girl anymore. Groom didn’t ask his permission, Bride walked herself down the aisle, no one asked him his opinion on a dad-blamed thing for this shindig he was paying for, etc. etc. Daddy also got the revelry part of the day started early, and by the time we were ready to start the ceremony was most of the way through a bottle of Jack Daniels. The big bottle.
So I get to that line and Daddy jumps up sluryelling that his little baby and the [expletive deleted] [expletive deleted][expletive incoherent][expletive anatomically impossible] groom, whose parentage Daddy called into question, couldn’t get married.
There was no real “impediment”, just a dad who finally heard a question, delivered more or less in his direction, and chose to make his opinion of the situation known.
So I shot a look at the bride, who was in the middle of wishing that a large hole would open in the earth’s crust and swallow her alive, and it was obvious that this was not entirely unexpected (although no one thought to warn me of the possibility!).
With a few carefully placed eyebrow wags and nods, I invited two fairly big ushers to take Daddy for a short walk out of earshot, and then I babbled desperately for a few minutes about the bonds of family and the new focus that marriage bring into people’s life and the sometimes struggles to balance your obligations to your family of origin and your family of creation, as it were. How there are rings of support around this couple, first each other, then their families, then the gathering of people here, then the larger community, the city, the state, etc. etc. How sometimes those we hope will support us won’t, and that we need to learn to turn to our own strengths and each other for support.
Or something like that. I kept talking until the bride (the earth was disobliging) and groom finally got their color back and segued back to the matter at hand and we finished off the ceremony. By the time we were done, there were cheers and tears (like every good wedding should have) and Daddy was passed out in the cloakroom. Literally.
Possibly because it’s easier to confirm a death?
Besides the records in each state, there is the Social Security Death Index which has that information.
It was not said at my wedding, but I liked what the minister did say.
After the vows, when we had already been declared married, the minister addressed us and said “If you know of anything that would divide your heart and soul from each other, let it now be left behind to the mercy of God”
which is irrelevant in Canada.
Recently at a Quaker wedding in the UK we weren’t asked if we had any objections, but after the bride and groom said they “did”, we were all asked if we would support their union and we all had to say “we do” too! It was really sweet 
I don’t know if that is standard Quaker stuff? It seems similar to The Lovely Margo Lane’s take on things…
Wow, that is sweet. I like it!
Thanks! Very interesting. Did you ever hear later if dad was apologetic, if bride chewed him a new one, if the marriage endured, etc.?
Ah, well, I think that speaks more about the lack of big venues/ hotels in that borough than anything to do with marriage licenses - I thought you were suggesting the council restricted the number of licenses they dish out.
My first marriage was performed in an Episcopalian church back in 1999, and the “speak now or forever hold your peace” line was used. (Or something along that lines, I don’t remember the exact wording.) During the wedding rehearsal, someone asked the reverend what exactly would happen if someone elected NOT to hold their peace, and he explained that the ceremony would be halted, we would proceed to a small room off to one side of the sanctuary that he pointed out, he would listen to any evidence or look over any paperwork that would indicate that the marriage would be illegal, and if nothing was found, proceed to finish the ceremony.
The reverend also boasted to us that of all the couples he’d married, none had yet to divorce. Our marriage was over in less than five years. LOL.
When I got married (a couple of decades ago) the priest told us that we had the option of having this said or not. He explained where it came from (basically, a socially polite way of asking “does anyone know if either of thee bozos is married somewhere else or has some other legal reason why we shouldn’t do this”) and said that most folks don’t have it said any more. However, some folks wanted it just because it’s in the old fashioned “traditional” ceremony. We opted not to have it.
ETA: Catholic church, btw.
Dunno about Quakers, but this is also part of the Episcopalian wedding liturgy. Here are excerpts from the Book of Common Prayer:
About 13 or 14 years ago I knew a co-worked had attended a wedding over the weekend and I asked her about it the following Monday. “Best wedding ever” she declared. She said when the Reverand asked “If any of you know cause…” the bride announced to the church that since the Groom and the Maid of Honor had screwed each other the night before that the wedding was off and for everyone, sans Groom’s friends and family, to meet her at so and so bar.
My friend was still in awe over the whole affair but did apparently have a great time, albeit a departure from what had been expected.
Timely video at i-am-bored.