No exchange of promises to each other to be married means your co-worker’s not married, Road Rash. Same thing for the couple who check into the hotel as Mr. & Mrs. You must fulfill all three requirments for a common law marriage to be valid (at least pending Jodi’s response to my inquiry ;)). Once again, those are the promises, the holding forth as married, and the cohabitation.
I remember an ugly child-support case a few years ago, with the actor John Hurt and his girlfriend. Her lawyer claimed that they were married because they had spent six weeks in SC while he was filming on location (they were residents of NY). I don’t believe they made any claim to be married. On the other hand, I don’t know how that claim did in court (I believe they wound up settling out of court).
I don’t have cites for the social security cases, but they were in a law student’s outline tapes I listened to last year as continuing education. The idea was to get survivor benefits for long term couples who never formally married.
I did have occasion to look up the law in Texas last year when a woman I knew wanted to know whether she was married to some guy who claimed she was his wife but had not actually signed the papers. So there is registering, and ther might be another way in Texas. The key here is to review the law of the state you reside in as it applies to your individual situation. This is highly dependent on the facts and the jurisdiction you live in.
Man, the States makes it hard.
I’ve been common-law married for about 7 years. In Canada, a couple is legally married if they are living together for 12 months.
You then get to take advantage of each other for tax purposes.
And as for why we do things this way-- well, in my case we’re a couple of completely non-religious people who can’t be bothered to participate in a ceremony that we don’t believe in.
Furthermore, same-sex couples were recently given access to the same common-law status as opposite-sex couples. Essentially, the only thing left which we can’t do is head down to City Hall and have it taken care of right then and there, which frankly I can wait on.
Geez, Cartooniverse must be wondering why he even takes the time to hunt down those websites & build the links. 
Check out his third link (you know, the one that says ‘this link is excellent’) to read some more about Sandra Jennings vs. William Hurt.
To quote from the Social Security Regulations:
I’m in a common law marriage, and I use the term regularly. On nearly every official form I have to fill out, I check off “married or common-law”. Having been legally married for 6 years, divorced, and now in a common law marriage for 6 years, I have yet to find a difference between the two types of marriages. My SO is treated as my spouse in every legal aspect I’ve come across.
Jodi, my prof was representing that D.C. law required only that the two people hold themselves out to be married, and only to a single third party. As far as I (or the rest of my class) could tell, he described no cohabitation requirement.
It looks as if that’s incorrect, based on my (admittedly cursory) reading of D.C. case law on the subject.
MINTY –
Uhhhhhhnnnnnnn . . . probably noplace. The difficulty is that “cohabitation” and “holding forth” are sometimes fuzzy. “Cohabitation” is generally (historically) defined as “living together as husband and wife,” which of course merely begs the question, insofar as common-law marriage is concerned. So to prove “cohabitation” you might have to show that live together as husband and wife. How do you do that? By showing that you signed documents that way, or told people you were, or something similar. In other words, by proving that you have held yourself out to be married. So in some jurisdictions, AFAIK, one need not separately prove "held-out"ness if one can prove “cohabitation” – because at the end of the day the proof required is probably the same.
GADARENE –
And doesn’t that give you a warm fuzzy feeling?
Gotcha, Jodi. But it seems to me like that two-pronged “cohabitation” test still leaves you with the same three requirements: telling each other you’re married, telling other people you’re married, and shacking up. I’ll be sure to use “shacking up” in place of “cohabitating” from now on.
CLM is extremely important in US criminal law. In fact, much of case law for CLM has been established in criminal proceedings.
Imagine, you kill someone (was it murder?) and the only witness is your live-in SO (“Significant Other”). DA wants testimony that demonstrates a crime, so you claim SO is your spouse by CL.
Desired result, if successful, is no witness that can be compelled to testify that you did the evil deed.
Anyone know if the spouse can be compelled to testify against the other spouse in Canada, eh?
A common law marriage is a legally valid union without solemnization. That is, a marriage without a wedding.
When I took the Multistate Bar Exam (1993) there were still eight states which recognized common law marriage. They were all west of the Mississippi. Generally they are states which historically had a strong Roman Catholic tradition; in the Church’s view a couple marry each other, and the official, whether a priest or a civil authority, merely witnesses that fact.
In Ireland, there is a whole subculture of people known as “Travellers” (some Travellers are referred to as “Tinkers”) who traditionally use only common law marriages. John Millington Synge, author of “The Playboy of the Western World”, wrote a play called “The Tinker’s Wedding” in which a priest asks a Tinker woman why she is so keyed up to have a wedding since she and her cohabitant have been married in the eyes of God for years, having exchanged promises in the Traveler tradition and having held themselves out to the community as man and wife. It is thought that this is the method which was used by the early Christians.
Since a common law marriage is an honest-to-goodness marriage, it is subject to the provisions of family law the same as any other marriage. In the United States there is no common law divorce; the participants in a common law marriage have to go through a regular divorce proceeding the same as any couple who had a wedding if they wish to be free to marry someone else, and a court can (and sometimes does) order a participant in a common law marriage to pay their ex-spouse maintenance the same as if they had a wedding. As a practical matter, the court will first make a judicial finding that a marriage exists, and then rule that it terminated by divorce.
The institution of common law marriage was far more widespread in pioneer days, when a circuit judge or preacher might not be within reach for months or even years, but a couple in a backwoods community wished to be recognized as man and wife. Many states had common law marriage laws but abolished them in the late 19th Century as the frontier closed.
Generally, common law marriage requires that a couple meet the ordinary requirements to enter marriage (i.e., be of lawful age, not be already married to someone else, etc.) and that they “hold forth” to the community at large that they consider themselves to be man and wife. There is no time limit requirement which has to be satisfied in the United States.
Under the Full Faith and Credit Clause of the U.S. Constitution, each state is required to recognize the laws of the other states. Thus, if a couple would be viewed as having a valid common law marriage in (say) Louisiana, which recognizes such unions, and then move to (say) Illinois, which does not, the courts of Illinois are obliged to recognize them as married. The situation is analogous to what happens if a young couple get legally married in one state, and then move to another where they are not considered old enough to get married without parental permission.
The issue of Common Law Marriage is relevant in any case where marital status is significant. This includes criminal prosecutions where a witness or a defendant wishes to invoke spousal privilege against testimony, or in cases where a person dies intestate; the widow or widower has the same rights to inherit as they would had there been a wedding.
Occasionally a court has stretched the rules to find that a common law marriage existed in order to avoid gross inequity. For instances, there are cases where a couple held out that they were man and wife for many years in a state which did not actually recognize common law marriage, but a court later held that the survivor was a lawful widow or widower, and therefore entitled to inherit, because the couple had briefly stayed, but did not actually reside, in a state which did recognize common law marriage.
IAA (Texas) L.
Texas CLM:
- Holding out.
- Cohabitation.
- Intent to be married. (I’m almost certain that’s it).
– OR –
a “declaration of informal marriage” filed down at the courthouse (signed by both). And it’s a done deal.
The whys?
One place where it can be quite important: wrongful-death (and other serious injury) lawsuits. In TX the widow/CL wife has certain rights that a girlfriend, no matter how close, does. It can lead to some sticky situations, particularly when the deceased isn’t there to have a say in the matter.
There are, and have been for quite a while, 12 states plus DC that recognize CL marriages, if you read the prior posts.
Pa., RI and SC all recognize CL marriages and they are east of the Mississippi the last time I checked a map.
You forgot an essential element: they must intend to be married. That is a paramount feature of the CL marriage and the really distinguishing feature from just shacking up. Otherwise, this is a good and complete post.