The most happily married candidate? Women say...

by Andrew Malcolm

Which presidential couple has the happiest marriage?

True, it may be absolutely none of our business. But as Americans go through the peculiar political osmosis of evaluating all the candidates who want to be their president, they slowly make a series of personal judgments about the candidates -- and their families.

And, according to a new poll for the Ladies' Home Journal, a majority of American women (52 percent) have decided that right now of the major political contenders, Elizabeth and John Edwards have the happiest marriage, whatever that means. Whether that is true or not, who knows?

But a majority of both Republicans (52 percent) and Democrats (58 percent) felt that way. Opinions about the marital happiness of the rest of the couples tended to break along party lines, with their own party members feeling they were happier than opposing party members did.

Last month's poll of 502 women over 18 (with a margin of error of 4.4 percent) found they felt the second happiest candidate couple was Michelle and Barack Obama (43 percent), with Cindy and John McCain next at 35 percent.

The decision about the fourth happiest couple may surprise some, even them. It's Judith and Rudy Giuliani, who between them have six marriages, four of them presumably not so happy. The Giulianis were right behind the McCains at 34 percent.

The fifth happiest marriage, according to these 502 women, may also surprise some who lived through the 1990s in the United States. Yes, that's right, Hillary and Bill Clinton are thought to be the most happily married couple by 29 percent.

They're ahead of Ann and Mitt Romney, who've been married 30+ years, with 24 percent, Jeri and Fred Thompson with 20 percent and, lastly, Barbara and Bill Richardson, who might be interested to know they are only believed to be happy by 12 percent of respondents. Numbers for the last three couples may be lower because they are less well-known.

Stephanie Coontz, a contributing editor to the magazine, said that, "Women tend to be judged more harshly than men for not having a happy marriage." About Sen. Clinton, she said, "She's blamed for being too concerned with her own career and independent of her family. And she's also blamed for not packing up and leaving her husband."

The poll figures also showed that African American women, by a significant proportion -- 62 percent compared to 39% for white women -- say their perception of a candidate's married life would not affect their vote.

Andrew Malcolm writes for Top of the Ticket, the L.A. Times' political blog