Merren v. Commissioner’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

2 federal appellate · 1 district ·

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 16 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “* * * The property which was sold and which gave rise to the money, the income now under consideration, was the separate property of the husband. He had sold it and had completely divested himself of title thereto and dominion thereover prior to his marriage. At the time of the sale the amount to be received by the petitioner was definitely fixed and constituted an obligation due him. The right to receive the purchase price was itself property; it became vested in the petitioner prior to his marriage and could not, therefore, become community property under the Louisiana statute. The fact that the petitioner’s right to receive money was satisfied by payments made to him after his marriage does not, in our opinion, change the situation. The controlling principle is that, as between husband and wife, “ when a right, legal or equitable, is acquired^ whether before or during marriage, all things of value into which the initial right develops by the performance of conditions, the running of time or the like, or if the initial right rests in obligation, all that which is obtained through the performance, discharge, satisfaction, enforcement, or assignment of the obligation, are deemed in law to have been acquired as of the date of the acquisition of the initial right, and take the character, separate or common, of that right.” McKay on Community Property, secs. 517 and 533. * * *”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Houston v. Commissioner