Smith v. Smith’s Empirical Analysis
1908
Citation profile
51 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 51 later decisions — most recently February 1980 · most notably Ralls v. Johnson (1917), Fowlkes v. Clay (1921)
51 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 John Smith v. Robert Bell · Croxall v. Shererd · Downing v. . Marshall · Norris v. . Beyea · Crozier v. . Bray
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 51 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“The testatrix having made a will, and being some years afterwards dissatisfied with it, declared in a codicil a deliberate purpose to change it, which she at once proceeded to do. This emphasizes the change, and is a caution to the courts to observe with care the mandates of the codicil embodying the change. * * *”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Austin v. Pepperman“The rule is that survivorship between devisees never relates to the death of the testator, unless there is no other time to which it can be referred, and that it naturally relates to the death on which a previous estate terminates and on which the new estate is limited. ( 157 Ala. at 88 , 47 So. at 223 , 224 .)”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
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.