The principle of recognition of marriage concluded in the registry office: the problems of theory and practice

Introduction: the principles of law are the core of any branch of law, defining the vector of its development and helping to fill in the legal loopholes identified in the course of law enforcement activities. The study of the principles of law is necessary because the unambiguousness and justification (in terms of the legal drafting methodology) of their formulation depends on the efficiency of their implementation, determined by the norms of the relevant industry affiliation. Family law in this sense is not an exception, and one of its least studied principles is the principle of recognition of marriage concluded in the registry office. The article aims to investigate the mechanism of implementing the principle of recognition of marriage concluded in the registry office. Methods: the methodological framework for this study is a set of methods of scientific knowledge, among which the main ones are the methods of system analysis, historicism and the comparative law method. Results: the paper considers the modern problems of implementing the principle of recognition of marriage in the registry office, as well as studies the concept and content of such categories as “legal status”, “marriage” and “acts of civil status”, presents the ways of improving the legal mechanism to register marriages in the registry office, identifies the main goal and public interest in creating a system of registration of marriages, namely, by the registry office, and not by the religious organizations. Conclusions: the paper substantiates that the processes of globalization, as well as the development of technology, computer science and medicine will constantly set the legislator the task of adopting new family law norms, and the vector of such an activity should be determined by the family law principles. Therefore, the formulation of the principle of marriage registration as a special legal status in the registry office requires further discussion, taking into account these modern realities. Thus, it appears that under the current legislation, and the historical traditions in Russia it is inappropriate to consider marriage as a treaty or agreement, since its legal regulation is more inclined to constitutional law, rather than to civil law, focusing not so much on property as on personal non-property rights of spouses, relationships with children and etc. So the concept of marriage as a voluntary union of a man and a woman is more convincing.