1-1 By: Goodman, Thompson (Senate Sponsor - Harris) H.B. No. 336
1-2 Combs
1-3 (In the Senate - Received from the House May 4, 1995;
1-4 May 5, 1995, read first time and referred to Committee on
1-5 Jurisprudence; May 16, 1995, reported favorably by the following
1-6 vote: Yeas 7, Nays 0; May 16, 1995, sent to printer.)
1-7 A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
1-8 AN ACT
1-9 relating to proceedings to prove certain informal marriages.
1-10 BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
1-11 SECTION 1. Section 1.91(b), Family Code, is amended to read
1-12 as follows:
1-13 (b) If a <A> proceeding in which a marriage is to be proved
1-14 under Subsection (a)(2) is not <this section must be> commenced
1-15 before the second anniversary of <not later than one year after>
1-16 the date on which the parties separated and ceased living together,
1-17 it is rebuttably presumed that the parties did not enter into an
1-18 agreement to be married <relationship ended or not later than one
1-19 year after September 1, 1989, whichever is later>.
1-20 SECTION 2. (a) This Act takes effect September 1, 1995.
1-21 (b) The change in law made by this Act to a suit brought to
1-22 prove the existence of an informal marriage applies only to a suit
1-23 commenced on or after the effective date of this Act. A suit
1-24 commenced before that date is governed by the law in effect on the
1-25 date the suit was commenced and the former law is continued in
1-26 effect for that purpose.
1-27 (c) The change in law made by this Act to Section 1.91,
1-28 Family Code, does not permit an action to be commenced on or after
1-29 the effective date of this Act to prove the existence of an
1-30 informal marriage for which an action was barred before the
1-31 effective date of this Act for failure to bring the action before
1-32 the first anniversary of the date the relationship ended.
1-33 SECTION 3. The importance of this legislation and the
1-34 crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
1-35 emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
1-36 constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
1-37 days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended.
1-38 * * * * *