The difficult part is not the find and replace part of it, though I doubt you could do it for all the laws in the country that mention marriage in 60 seconds. The difficult part is convincing federal and 50 state legislatures to agree to it.
ETA: I see that Polycarp already said this upthread and you acknowledged this difficulty.
Did you know about the schismatics and heretics in your denomination? 
Why limited to two?
MEBuckner detailed some of the logistical hurdles several years ago. I’ve made a similar post, but I couldn’t find it. There are over a thousand rights and obligations already established in the law as pertain to marriage; introducing more than two partners will have pretty broad implications, not all of which are clear.
My objections to polygamous marriage are entirely logistical. Figure out ways to make it happen and I’ll happily support it. But given how low the logistical hurdle is to SSM, I think separating SSM from polygamy is wise.
HERETICS!!! Hellfire, damnation, and back acne upon them and what e’er they beget.
Nothing I couldn’t fix with an easy Find/Replace in my word processor!
Give it your best shot.
Show me a sample law and I’ll change it! Change two to “two or more” or “several”. Done!
Bob, Jennie, and Lisa are in a plural marriage. As they understand it, Bob is married to Jennie and to Lisa, but Jennie and Lisa are not married to each other. Bob slips into a probably irreversible coma. Jennie thinks he would prefer extreme measures; Lisa thinks he would prefer to be off the machines. What do you do? Does your decision change if it’s Lisa who slipped into the coma, and Bob and Jennie have the disagreement? How do you write the law?
Or find a law on custody after a divorce. If Jennie divorces Bob, does Lisa gain visitation rights to Jennie and Bob’s children?
Here’s how I would define plural marriage: any number of people can be married, but if two people are married, and a third person wants to get married to them, the new third person has to marry both people - i.e. you can’t have person A married to B and C without B and C being married to each other. Any one person can only be in one marriage at a time.
Write it the same way: “Surrogates may act in the following order of priority: 1) a legally appointed guardian, 2) a spouse, 3) an adult child, 4) a parent, 5) an adult sibling, and 6) a close relative or friend.”
Suppose Bob, Jennie and Lisa are in a plural marriage. With my definition of plural marriage, Jennie and Lisa have to be married to each other - there is one marriage including all three. Jennie and Lisa make the decision. You might say “what if they don’t agree?” To which I reply that we have the same situation now. What if a child is sick, and the father and mother disagree about how the child should be treated. Who gets to decide? Whatever method is used in my second example (parents that disagree) will be used in the first example (two spouses disagree.)
As before, there is only one marriage. There are three parents: Jennie, Bob, Lisa.
If Jennie divorces Bob and Lisa, then does Lisa get visitation rights?
Same thing could happen now if I marry a woman who has children from a previous marriage. Me and my wife raise the children together, then she divorces me. Do I have visitation rights for those children even though they are not my biological children? How does it work now? Use that same method for the plural marriage scenario.
And of course that’s part of the problem, part of what makes polygamy a more complex issue. There’s no agreement on what kind of polygamy would be practiced. Unlike SSM, which is just “we want what they have too”.
LOL when I read this all I hear is Rowan Atkinson “use sodomise instead of solemnise” anyways I have said time and time again changing the term is a simple fix but does not address larger issues.
This does not really solve one of the big concerns that some group have, that is that churches are in themselves discriminatory. I say “so what?” they have their views and forcing them to modify behavior will not change their thinking.
Also the issue as I see it also extends to how a couple are treated under law, do they have access to Superannuation [401K?], shared health cover, burial rights etc etc that a normal married or defacto spouse would have?
This comes from a straight man who was one of the best men at a gay marriage ceremony.
Anyway just a simple Aussie view
Well, fortunately, this atheist will remain married, since we did it in Japan. You go to your local city hall, fill in the paperwork, they stamp it and you’re married.
If you want to go to a church and have a priest mumble your names, that’s fine, but that has no legal standing.
I think the idea would be that “marriage” would become an unregulated term, and you could call yourself married or not married and the law wouldn’t care any more than if you went around calling yourself “sexy”. Churches could enforce rules on what conditions must be met for it to recongize a marriage, so if some local church tells you that it considers you in sin because it doesn’t recognize your marriage, then that’s a matter between you and the church. if you don’t like it, find another church.
I was under the impression that this is sometimes used for destination weddings - a barebones legal ceremony is done locally and then you can have an elaborate, expensive ceremony anywhere in the world and it doesn’t matter that you didn’t comply with the laws regarding validity of the ceremony in a jurisdiction you are not familiar with. This might also be helpful if your country doesn’t recognize foreign marriages or something but you have your heart set on saying “I do” at some famous landmark.
In the US, people just love changing churches and forming new ones for whatever reason they feel like. There are some denominations that are infamous for schisming over issues much less serious than the definition of marriage. Don’t like the teachings of your church on not wearing sandals in the sanctuary? Join another one or start your own. That’s what America is about, isn’t it?
Follow the sandal, no follow the gourd. Monty Python had it right
If “gay marriage” was legal, it does not mean that every church would have to offer them. Churches would still be allowed to behave as if it were 1400.
I think that my definition would make the most sense if we agree with the premise that SSM should be allowed. A marriage can include more than two people, but everyone is part of the marriage.
A nine-person marriage dissolves completely, with incomes ranging from zero to a quarter-million dollars. Three of the women have children in the marriage. Everyone involved now hates everyone involved; they all sue for full custody of all the children, and they fight bitterly over child support.
Cite the relevant case-law the judge will use in untangling this mess.
Again, I’m not saying it shouldn’t be done. I’m saying the models are far more complicated and untested for polygamous marriage than for SSM, and we should get SSM done before talking multiple marriage.
Of course there won’t be relevant case law, since this has never happened before. But if you want to argue the lack of relevant case law, then we should never pass any new laws.
In principle, it works the same as with two people, except that everything has to be divided nine ways instead of two ways.