Chamberlain v. State Farm Mutual, No. 14-167 (W.D. Pa. May 12, 2016) is one of those cases with a very low chance of being relevant to anything that ever crosses your desk. But it’s a unique situation -- which makes it interesting and worthwhile to check out. In fact, I’ve never actually seen this issue before. Granted, I doubt if Chamberlain is the first time it has ever come up; but probably not often. I could have done some work to see how common it is, but I didn’t have the mojo.

Edward Kunsman was injured in a motor-vehicle accident while working near an active construction zone as a flagger. The insurer for the at-fault tortfeasor had a policy with a $50,000.00 bodily injury limit, which was paid to Mr. Kunsman. At the time of the accident, Vicki Jo Chamberlain maintained a policy of automobile insurance with State Farm with a $15,000.00 per person limit.

The policy included underinsured motorist benefits, which provided: “We will pay compensatory damages for bodily injury that an insured is legal entitled to recover from the owner or driver of an uninsured motor vehicle.” The policy defined “insured” to include “Resident Relatives,” defined as “a person, other than you, who resides primarily with the first person shown as the named insured on the declaration page who is [r]elated to that named insured or his or her spouse by blood, marriage, or adoption.”

So the issue was this: Was Mr. Kunsman an insured under Ms. Chamberlain’s policy, so as to be able to collect underinsured motorist benefits? More specifically, the question was tied to whether Mr. Kunsman was Ms. Chamberlain’s spouse. Seems like an easy issue – except that, if Mr. Kunsman and Ms. Chamberlain were married, it was on a common law basis.

The Pennsylvania federal court went through a lengthy discussion of what is required to establish a common law marriage and then examined numerous aspects of the Kunsman -- Chamberlain relationship to determine if it qualified. [Incidentally, the court noted that the Pennsylvania legislature abolished the doctrine of common law marriage as of January 1, 2005. But any common-law marriage otherwise lawful before that was still Kosher. Who knew?]

Given that, as I said, Chamberlain v. State Farm Mutual has a very low chance of being relevant to anything you do, I’ll keep the analysis to the high points.

At issue was summary judgment – did the plaintiffs produce sufficient evidence to support their claim that they had a common law marriage? These were some of the facts at issue:

“Ms. Chamberlain and Mr. Kunsman began dating in 1995 or 1996. In December 1996, Mr. Kunsman presented Ms. Chamberlain with a ring, which she accepted. Ms. Chamberlain and Mr. Kunsman did not participate in a marriage ceremony at any time after December 1996, and they did not exchange any vows with the specific purpose of establishing a present tense marital relationship after December 1996. Ms. Chamberlain and Mr. Kunsman have two children, born in 1998 and 2000. . . . Plaintiffs state that they jointly own a vehicle; they own their home together; they have an insurance policy on their home; and they obtained a mortgage in both of their names. Plaintiffs assert that they are known in their community as husband and wife.” State Farm’s positon, in response to all this, was that “[p]laintiffs did not express a present-tense intention to enter into a marriage contract in December 1996,” as required under law.

Putting aside lots of other factoids about the Kunsman -- Chamberlain relationship, that were relevant to whether a common law marriage existed, the court ultimately held that “[p]laintiffs have established sufficient evidence to create an issue of material fact as to whether they exchanged words in the present tense spoken with the purpose of establishing the relationship of husband and wife. [I]t is well settled that [t]he common law marriage contract does not require any specific form of words, and all that is essential is proof of an agreement to enter into the legal relationship of marriage at the present time.”

What a great line: As for Plaintiffs’ effort to establish a common-law marriage, by presenting clear and convincing evidence of the exchange of words in the present tense, spoken with the purpose of establishing the relationship of husband and wife, Ms. Chamberlain testified at her deposition that she believed that Mr. Kunsman stated, “Will you be my wife,” when he presented her with a diamond ring in 1996. Ms. Chamberlain testified that Mr. Kunsman’s mother asked her: “[Y]ou really want him to be your husband?”