US states didn't keep track of it until around the civil war. There was no central authority at all. To prove bigamy, you'd have to go figure out where a person got married the first time and get the record from that church, and then bring it to the sheriff/police in the town where the bigamist was openly married to someone else.
A little before the civil war, northern states offered it as a service. It was very useful for married black couples, so that nobody accused one of the parties of being an escaped slave. I researched this a while back when gay marriage was just getting started in the news.
US states didn't keep track of it until around the civil war. There was no central authority at all. To prove bigamy, you'd have to go figure out where a person got married the first time and get the record from that church, and then bring it to the sheriff/police in the town where the bigamist was openly married to someone else.
A little before the civil war, northern states offered it as a service. It was very useful for married black couples, so that nobody accused one of the parties of being an escaped slave. I researched this a while back when gay marriage was just getting started in the news.