Mathews v. Sears Pension Plan’s Empirical Analysis
144 F.3d 461 · 1998
Citation profile
44 federal appellate · 2 district ·
How this case has been cited
Cited by 85 later decisions — most recently March 2020 · most notably Kearney v. Standard Insurance (1999), Herzberger v. Standard Insurance (2000)
44 federal appellate · 2 district ·
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 26 U.S.C. § 417 · 29 U.S.C. § 1054 (§ 204 of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974) · 29 U.S.C. § 1102 (§ 402 of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974)
Relies on Firestone Tire and Rubber Company v. Bruch · Feltner v. Columbia Pictures Television, Inc. · Hansen v. Continental Insurance · Central States, Southeast & Southwest Areas Pension Fund v. Gerber Truck Service, Inc. · McAbee Construction, Inc. v. United States
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 85 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“In limited circumstances ... parties are allowed to present extrinsic evidence to demonstrate that although the contract looks clear, anyone who understood the context of its creation would understand that it doesn’t mean what it seems to mean. This is the doctrine of extrinsic ambiguity.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage“while the starting point in resolving an issue of interpretation of an ERISA ... plan is the general law of contracts, the ending point may be different if the general law doesn't fit the issue because of something either in ERISA or in the nature of a pension plan.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage“If a written contract is clear, that is, if reading it one doesn’t sense any ambiguity, gap, or contradiction that makes one doubt one’s ability to understand the contract merely by reading it, the court normally won’t look further for evidence of meaning. This is the venerable ‘four corners’ rule. Its purpose is to protect contracting parties from the uncertainty that would attend their obligations if a judge or jury were free to consider evidence that would contradict the terms of a written contract.... In such a regime all contracts would be revisable by judges and juries.... The security that one seeks from having a written statement of one’s legal rights and duties would be destroyed.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage
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.