Ely v. Ely’s Empirical Analysis
1981
Citation profile
45 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 45 later decisions — most recently April 2020 · most notably Mullin v. Phelps (1994), Begins v. Begins (1998)
45 state decisions
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
Applies 42 U.S.C. § 1382 (§ 1611 of the Social Security Act of 1935) · 42 U.S.C. § 1882
Relies on Goldberg v. Kelly · Platt v. Shields · Hatch v. Hatch · Loeb v. Loeb · Cleary v. Cleary
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 45 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“almost always [involve] the financial circumstances and abilities of the parties as matters in controversy, and [are] matters of common occurrence in the trial courts, obviat[ing] the necessity for a separate hearing, or the taking of particular evidence, on the question of awarding of attorney fees or suit money. In the usual, and vast majority of, cases such allowance borders on judicial routine, and is supported by evidence bearing on the circumstances of the parties generally.”
5 later decisions quote this exact passagee.g. Turner v. Turner · Bibens v. Bibens
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.