A common-law marriage allowes for some marriage law to apply to couples who have lived together a certain length of time. The exact laws that apply — and the time necessary to trigger common-law status — vary by state.

Generally speaking, a common law marriage status for those states that offer it require that a couple:

• Live together for a “significant period of time” (usually not defined by state law).
• Hold themselves out as a married couple (using the same last name, referring to the other as “my husband” or “my wife,” etc.).
• Intend to be married.

Many states that offered common-law marriage have abolished it by statute. Common-law marriage was seen by legislators as encouraging fraud, condoning vice, debasing conventional marriage, and as no longer necessary with easy access to the agents of the state that officiate legal marriage — such as clergy, and justices of the peace.

Courts outside of the U.S. have periodically used their country’s common-law marriage status to allow certain domestic partner benefits apply to same-sex couples, most notably in Canada.
      [Please see our article: Legal Marriage Report]

• Pennsylvania

  This state had a common-law marriage status until an appeals court abolished it on September 17, 2003. The court said that it is no longer necessary to give longtime, live-in couples the benefits of marriage without a license. The Commonwealth Court said recognizing such unions has created an impossible situation for third parties trying to determine whether a person is married or single.

  “Many sound reasons exist to abandon a system that allows the determination of important rights to rest on evidence fraught with inconsistencies, ambiguities and vagaries,” Judge Bonnie Brigance Leadbetter wrote in her decision.

  She added that the circumstances that created a need for common-law marriage have dissipated. These were the potential unavailability of a preacher in colonial times, and the dependence of women on men for support.

  The ruling, was made in the case of John Kretz, who sought pension benefits after his common-law wife, Janet Stamos, died in a 1994 plane crash. The ruling will not affect any existing common-law marriages, but will bar people from entering into them in the future. The case could be appealed.
  

• Washington State

  There have been some court judgments in Washington which have created a “quasi-common-law” status. This has sometimes been applied to same-sex couples.

  This “quasi” status was totally dismissed for use by for same-sex couples in an Appeals Court ruling on February 11, 2000 in Vasquez v. Hawthorne. However, in May 2002, the state Supreme Court ruled that their 30-year, same-sex relationship was enough like a marriage to grant the survivor a share of his deceased partner’s estate.

  In November 2002, a Yakima County Superior Court judge ruled that two women ending a 10-year relationship divide their assets equally, a decision that amounts to a divorce in a state that did not recognize same-sex marriage. Judge Heather Van Nuys said the relationship between Yakima physician Julia Robertson and Seattle nurse Linda Gormley was “sufficiently marriagelike to provide equitable relief.”

  Future state laws could easily eliminated these “quasi-common-law” status situations.