127 Wis. 2d 318 - Brown v. Thomas’s Empirical Analysis
1985
Citation profile
51 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 53 later decisions — most recently April 2018 · most notably Heiman v. Parrish (1997), 162 Wis. 2d 797 - Koestler v. Pollard (1991)
51 state decisions — followed in 13 states
Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.
Relationships
Relies on Minnesota Mining & Manufacturing Co. v. New Jersey Wood Finishing Co. · 104 Wis. 2d 552 - Kollasch v. Adamany · 62 Wis. 2d 295 - Slawek v. Stroh · 111 Wis. 2d 116 - LePoidevin Ex Rel. Dye v. Wilson · 77 Wis. 2d 50 - Christensen v. Economy Fire & Casualty Co.
Most-quoted passages
The sentences later courts lift from this opinion, ranked by how many decisions quote each — the parts of the opinion doing the work. These counts are smaller than the citation total above because most of the 53 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“Where a gift of personal property is made with the intent to take effect irrevocably, and is fully executed by unconditional delivery, it is a valid gift inter vivos. [ ] Such a gift is absolute and, once made, cannot be revoked. [ ] A gift, however, may be conditioned on the performance of some act by the donee, and if the condition is not fulfilled the donor may recover the gift. [] We find the conditional gift theory particularly appropriate when the contested property is an engagement ring. The inherent symbolism of this gift [] forecloses the need to establish an express condition that marriage will ensue. Rather, the condition may be implied in fact or imposed by law in order to prevent unjust enrichment.”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage“[The question of, who is at fault, often becomes] lost in the murky depths of contradictory, acrimonious, and largely irrelevant testimony by disappointed couples, their relatives and friends.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage“`The ring is employed in rites of courtship and marriage in many cultures, primitive and sophisticated; in widely dispersed regions of the earth; persisting through the centuries, in fact millienia [sic]. In our culture, the ring is generally placed on one of the fingers, in others it may be attached to other positions of the anatomy, at intermediate points from the top of the head to the tip of the toes. It is a universal symbol of deep seated sexual and social ramifications, a seminal area of research for behavioral scientists. Is it any wonder that it presents such complicated problems for mere lawyers?'”
1 later decision quote this exact passagee.g. Heiman v. Parrish
How this case has been treated — in progress
Whether each later court followed, distinguished, criticized, or overruled this decision. The treatment classification (task #35) runs highest-cited cases first and lights up here as it reaches this one.