Fact or Myth: You Can Legally Marry Your Cousin in the State of Texas

In El Paso, with families being as big as they are, it probably happens more than we realize. In all honesty, the laws surrounding this are kinda confusing.

It has to do with "consanguinity", a big word with a complicated definition. You can read it here if you want, I gave up.

Long story short, it involves how closely two people are related. According to this, the "2nd cousins" point seems to be the cutoff. Legally though, it's tricky.

The Texas Family Code sums it up this way:

A marriage is void if one party to the marriage is related to the other as:

(1) an ancestor or descendant, by blood or adoption;

(2) a brother or sister, of the whole or half blood or by adoption;

(3) a parent's brother or sister, of the whole or half blood or by adoption;  or

(4) a son or daughter of a brother or sister, of the whole or half blood or by adoption. - codes.findlaw.com

That seems to pretty much rule out hooking up with the 'primo' ... or any other family member ... completely. Those lines are drawn so tightly, dating anyone with the same name or even a close friend is probably a no - no.

26 states are cool with it though.

The very idea is, to say the least, unsettling but where it really gets scary is when you get to the physical consequences of mingling the same blood lines.

Close family members having sex can wind up with children who, among other things, are more likely to suffer from disease and birth defects.

They also have a greater chance of being stillborn or dying as an infant and have shorter life expectancies if they do survive infancy/childhood.