The marriage contract is to be considered in law as a civil contract between two parties who are of opposite sex. All other marriages are declared to be contrary to the public policy of this state and are void. The consent of the parties is essential. The marriage ceremony may be regarded either as a civil ceremony or as a religious sacrament, but the marriage relation shall only be entered into, maintained or abrogated as provided by law.
K.S.A. 23-2501
Nature of marriage relation
Applied in 3 court decisions — leading case 996 F. Supp. 2d 542 - Bourke v. Beshear (2014)
Most recently applied in Jack Pidgeon and Larry Hicks v. Mayor Sylvester Turner and City of Houston (June 2017)
L. 2011, ch. 26, § 1; July 1.
How often courts cite this section
Court decisions citing this, by year. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.
Official source: Kansas Office of Revisor of Statutes. Reproduced from public-domain Kansas statutes; confirm against the official source for the current text. Not legal advice.