Williams v. Smith’s Empirical Analysis
1947
Citation profile
3 federal appellate · 20 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 25 later decisions — most recently May 2011 · most notably Shriner's Hospital for Crippled Children of Texas v. Stahl (1980), Sinnott v. Gidney (1959)
3 federal appellate · 20 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 Kent v. Dunham · State Bank of Chicago v. Gross · Bristol v. Stump · In re Woodward's Estate · Hoffmeister v. Amberg
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 25 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“Unless prohibited by the terms of the will or by statute, it is the general rule that pecuniary legacies bear interest from the time they are due and payable. Interest is not imposed upon the executor or trustee as penalty for his default or neglect; nor is the right to receive affected by delay in the administration or by suit to contest or construe the will. It is awarded purely as an incident of, or accretion to, the legacy itself as compensation for the loss the beneficiary suffers by reason of the delay.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Glass v. Cross““It must be presumed that the terms ‘rest and residue’ were used in their normal, usual and legal sense, with the result that nothing would pass to the trustees until all prior bequests, debts, and expenses of administration had been paid.””
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Sinnott v. Gidney
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.