Covenant marriage in Louisiana: A comparative analysis of couples who did, and did not, accept a new marital option

In August 1997, Louisiana became the first state in the nation to offer couples a choice of marriage licenses by passing the Covenant Marriage Act. Couples who choose a covenant marriage must receive premarital counseling and legally bind themselves to additional restrictions on their right to divorce.; To understand how this new choice of marital contracts has been received by couples during the first 18 months it was available, this research project developed a comparative analysis of two groups: couples who contracted for a covenant marriage and couples who did not. The project used an integrative qualitative/quantitative research design. Ethnographic interviews were conducted with both covenant marriage couples (n = 8) and non-covenant couples (n = 8) and with clerks of court (n = 11) who offer the choice to couples. The results of the qualitative phase were used to develop variables for a questionnaire administered to a representative sample (n = 1040) of individuals who did not choose a covenant marriage and a representative sample (n = 508) of those who did.; The research demonstrated that most couples remain unaware of covenant marriage; that the option of covenant marriage is not routinely presented to couples when they file for a marriage license; and that when it is presented clerks tend to explain it in negative terms. Individuals who contract for a covenant marriage are on average younger, better educated, predominantly white, more likely to attend a Baptist or non-denominational church, attend church more frequently, and are engaged for longer periods of time than those who do not. Individuals who chose a covenant marriage most often did so as a way of providing reassurance to their partner and because they view its restrictions on divorce as marital insurance in the case of future relationship difficulties. Non-covenant couples are more likely to use a Justice of the Peace for their wedding and to have lived together before marriage. This project is the first statewide study of covenant marriage using a probability sample.