Marriage fee proposal could be left at the Legislative altar

A bill that’d raise marriage license fees for couples who do not undergo pre-marital counseling may be in trouble. The bill cleared the republican-controlled Senate last week, but House Republican Leader Christopher Rants of Sioux City isn’t wild about the proposal. Rants says he’s not enamored with the idea of raising the cost of getting married.The bill proposes a 50-dollar marriage license fee for couples who do not go through counseling sessions, and those couples’d have to wait 30 days to get married. Rants says he and his wife did not get pre-marital counseling.Rants says after 10 years, he and his wife have been doing o-k without that counseling, and he’d hate to think other couples who made the same choice would have to pay more to get their marriage license. Bill backers say lowering the fee for those who do get pre-marital counseling would encourage more couples to think seriously about the institution of marriage.