Buckmaster v. Bertram’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

56 state decisions

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

1. ““On its face the agreement is too uncertain to be enforceable by way of specific performance. ‘It is elementary that specific performance will not be enforced unless the contract not only contains all the material terms, but also expresses each in a sufficiently definite manner. In Pomeroy on Contracts (section 159) it is said: “An uncertain contract . . . may perhaps embrace, in a partial manner, all the material terms, but on account of the inexact, indefinite, or obscure language in which one or more of them is stated, it fails to express the intent of the parties with sufficient clearness to enable a court of equity to enforce its provisions. The specific performance of an agreement, thus uncertain, will not be decreed. ’ ’ As said in 26 American and English Encyclopedia of Law (second edition, page 33) : “The contract sought to be enforced must, at all events, be so certain that its meaning can be ascertained, as an indefinite contract cannot be enforced, because the courts do not know what the parties agreed. The meaning and intent of the parties should be placed beyond the bounds of mere conjecture by full and clear proof.” ’ (Reymond v. Laboudigue, 148 Cal. 691, 694 [ 84 P. 189, 190 ].)””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 217 Cal. App. 2d 521 - Mueller v. Chandler