Educated at Sacre Coeur, Glen Iris, Melbourne and the University of Melbourne, Marie Tehan qualified as a lawyer. She married Jim Tehan in 1963 and settled in regional Victoria.

After producing six children she established her own legal practice in Mansfield, Victoria in 1970.

She was elected to the Victorian Parliament in 1987 at a by-election and retired from Parliament in 1999. She died at Nagambie after a short illness on 31 October 2004.

Sources used to compile this entry: Victorian Parliamentary Handbook / prepared by direction of the President of the Legislative Council and the Speaker of the Legislative Assembly, Parliament of Victoria, Melbourne, 1989, 106 pp; Carrying on the Fight: Women Candidates in Victorian Parliamentary Elections, Australian Women's Archives Project, 2008, http://www.womenaustralia.info/exhib/cws/home.html; Neto, Maryanne (researcher) (ed.), Who's Who in Australia 1998, 38 edn, Information Australia Group Pty Ltd, Melbourne, 1997, 1720 pp; Tehan, Marie, A profile of reform in Victoria's public health system : an address to the Hong Kong Hospital Authority Plenary session, Department of Health and Community Services, Melbourne, 1994, 20 pp; Tehan, Marie, Small rural hospitals task force report : ministerial responses, Department of Health and Community Services, Melbourne, 1995.