Fields v. Fields’s Empirical Analysis
1940
Citation profile
47 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 47 later decisions — most recently July 1993 · most notably Belford v. Belford (1947), 621 So. 2d 417 - Mize v. Mize (1993)
47 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
Relies on Frazier v. Frazier · Gayle v. Gayle · Kennedy v. Kennedy
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 47 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““One other aspect of this controversy which impels us to the belief that the mother and father should share- the custody, the former for the greater part of the time, is the extreme youth of the children. We incline to the view of the Supreme Court of Alabama that ‘Other things being equal, * * * the mother of infants of tender years (is) best fitted to bestow the motherly affection, care, companionship, and early training suited to their needs.’ Gayle v. Gayle, 220 Ala. 400, 402 , 125 So. 638, 639 .””
2 later decisions quote this exact passage““The financial worth of persons, other than the parents, to whom children may be awarded is important only when it appears that the parents themselves are unable to provide the necessities of life and prevent their children from becoming the objects of charity and a charge upon the community. “The matter of custody cannot be placed upon any of the bases, welfare of the children, financial worth of the ones seeking their custody or desires of the parents without some regard for the others. . . .””
1 later decision quote this exact passagee.g. Penney v. Penney
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.