Sybert v. Sybert’s Empirical Analysis
1953
Citation profile
17 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 17 later decisions — most recently October 1979
17 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 Calvery v. Calvery · Hancock v. Butler · Wallace v. First National Bank of Paris · Lacey v. Floyd · Simonton v. White
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 17 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““The rule must inevitably apply in the instant case unless there is language qualifying the words ‘heirs of his body,’ showing that they were not used their technical sense, that is, to signify an indefinite succession of takers from generation to generation. Turning now to an examination of the particular provisions of the will under construction we find that the only qualifying words contained therein modify the estate of Fred Sybert — not the words ‘heirs of his body.’ The language ‘a life estate only, to manage, control and use for and during the term of his natural life’ is but a statement of the incidents of a life estate. The further language ‘and after the death of my said son, Fred Sybert, to vest in fee simple in the heirs of his body’ does not indicate that the words ‘heirs of his body’ were not used in their usual and technical sense. The expressions ‘vest in the heirs’ and ‘vest in fee simple in the heirs’ are identical in meaning.” “The language in.the will in this case brings it squarely within the rule, and whether or not the testator so intended is immaterial. While the court may be liberal in construing explanatory language so that the words ‘heirs’ or ‘heirs of his body’ will not be read in their technical sense, we cannot supply that language when it is omitted from the instrument itself.””
1 later decision quote this exact passagee.g. Finley v. Finley“‘[W]hen a person takes an estate of freehold, legally, or equitably, under a . will . . . and in the same instrument, there is a limitation, by way of remainder, either with or without the interposition of another estate, of an interest of the same legal or equitable quality, to his heirs, or heirs of his body, as a class of persons, to take in succession, from generation to generation, the limitation to the heirs entitles the ancestor to the whole estate.’ 4 Kent, 215. This result would follow, although the [will] might express that the first taker should have a life estate only. It is founded on the use of the technical words, “heirs,” or “heirs of his body,” in the . . . will.”
1 later decision quote this exact passagee.g. Toler v. Harbour
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.