So the idea is that the couple has previously been legally married (to each other) in some other jurisdiction? It might be bigamy by a literal reading of the law, but seems pretty clearly not included in its intent. They might however face other legal trouble for making false statements on the marriage license application.

I guess one could quibble about the meaning of "another". You could read it as "other than the living spouse". The alternative is "other than himself" which seems absurd to include since the person cannot marry himself anyway.

Surprisingly, the license application does not ask if you are currently married. Only asks how many marriages ended in divorce and death.

Which application are you looking at? The instructions at cityclerk.nyc.gov/content/marriage-license say "If you were married before, you must list all prior marriages."

@NateEldredge, what possible “quibble” is there over the meaning of “another”? As written it’s clear enough to me that the law quoted means someone not already your spouse. (But if you want to argue, apparently it is legal if “she” does it…). ;)

New York 's Domestic Relations Law section 6 provides that a marriage is void if the spouse from a prior marriage is living and said prior marriage has not been ended. Thus, a clerk should not issue a marriage license to a couple that is already married. If the license is issued and the marriage subsequently solemnized, it is void. This doesn't prevent the bigamy statute from applying, however.

@Nate Eldredge I was looking at colonie.org/departments/clerk/clerk-assets/marriage-license

The Colonie page says "This includes proof of dissolution of "ALL" the prior marriage(s) by either: - divorce decrees or - death certificates." That's pretty unambiguous.

@MichaelHall: All I'm saying is that both interpretations are grammatically valid. I agree that the overall intent of the statute seems very clear, but apparently not to the OP, so I was trying to see if the literal words had any more clues.

See: Bigamy definition and meaning | Collins English Dictionary. Notice the difference between British English and American English.

To the OP: how would marrying someone you are already married to NOT be considered a “renew vows situation”? Honestly your question reads like “The goal is to drive a clean car to the store with the least amount of effort. I just washed it and want to wash it again, but I don’t want to consider it a ‘rewash’ situation. Would it be considered washing two cars?” There may be a good question in here about obtaining additional certificates from other jurisdictions, but this isn't it. I wasn’t going to do this, but DV for situational absurdity.

@Michael Hall The goal is to get documentation that can be used as proof of marriage. Useful for things like sorting out a life insurance claim. Apologies for the shitty question.

That's called a marriage license. And no need to apologize, take this as an opportunity to improve the question. Or not...

@MichaelHall as a practical matter it can be a difficult and time consuming exercise in bureaucracy to legalize a marriage certificate from overseas, so if it were acceptable to remarry the same person locally it could save a lot of time and money. This question isn't "how can I obtain proof of marriage?" but "can I avoid having to do it the hard way?" In fact, it's narrower: "would this shortcut constitute bigamy?" The first sentence shows that the asker is well aware of the correct way of doing it.

@MichaelHall and actually, "another" in that statute means "other than the person contracting the marriage." That is, the "person" and the "other person" are the two people getting married, and if either person has a living spouse then both are guilty of bigamy.

@NateEldredge "other than himself" is far less absurd than "other than his living spouse" since interpreting "another person" to mean "other than his living spouse" renders the phrase "at a time when he has a living spouse" superfluous.

@phoog, I know what "another" means, so it seems you are agreeing with me? (your comment reads like a correction...) And I understand the intent of the question too, as well as the intent of laws against bigamy. (i.e. to prevent multiple spouses, NOT to prevent having more than one license covering the same marriage but from different jurisdictions to facilitate local recognition of the union.)