Common-Law Marriage

During the last 15 years of the twentieth century a growing number of states, counties, and municipalities granted qualified legal recognition to unmarried "domestic partners." Known in some jurisdictions as "reciprocal beneficiaries," unmarried couples who receive legal recognition as domestic partners may be eligible for HEALTH INSURANCE benefits, life insurance benefits, and child VISITATION RIGHTS. Depending on the jurisdiction, domestic partners may also be entitled to hospital visitation rights.

However, in most jurisdictions domestic partners may only inherit from their partners or their partner's family if they are specifically named in the deceased's will. A few states allow domestic partners to inherit from each other or each other's family in the absence of a will, called interstate succession. By contrast, the law of all states that recognize common-law marriage allow both parties to the common-law marriage to inherit under state intestacy laws when either spouse dies without a will.

Also unlike common-law marriages, domestic partners may not typically ask courts to settle their post-relationship property disputes. Nor may domestic partners petition courts for ALIMONY awards, unless the partners entered a formal agreement for palimony prior to their cohabitation. Marvin v. Marvin, 18 Cal.3d 660, 557 P.2d 106, 134 Cal. Rptr. 815 (Cal. 1976). But if partners do enter a palimony agreement, they will generally be enforced, unless during the period of cohabitation the partners resided in Illinois, Georgia, and Tennessee, the three states that have expressly refused to recognize palimony agreements.

Every jurisdiction recognizing domestic partners as a legal entity has its own list of formal requirements that unmarried couples must satisfy before they will be formally recognized as domestic partners. The formal requirements in no two jurisdictions are identical. However, most jurisdictions do share many of the same core requirements.

These core requirements include that both partners must be older than 18 and unmarried, currently live together, apply together before a public official with authority to recognize them as domestic partners, and pay the related fees to be registered. To end a domestic partnership, most jurisdictions allow the couple simply to send a letter to the registrar of domestic partners. The letter must be dated and signed by both partners, and it must specifically request that the domestic partnership be terminated.

Laws in eight states and more than 100 municipalities now provide legal recognition for unmarried couples as domestic partners. This legislation often allows both opposite-sex and same-sex couples to form domestic partnerships, unlike the states that recognize common-law marriage, none of which expressly permits homosexual common-law marriages, and some of which expressly prohibit it. Pursuant to state and local domestic-partner legislation, 157 Fortune 500 companies, 3,960 private employers and unions, and 158 COLLEGES AND UNIVERSITIES were as of mid-2003 providing benefits to domestic partners. Although no nationwide statistics exist, the 2000 census revealed almost 10,000 domestic partners were registered in St. Louis, Missouri, alone, and more than 15,000 same-sex couples were registered as domestic partners in California.