Morgan v. Morgan’s Empirical Analysis
1920
Citation profile
11 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 11 later decisions — most recently November 1973
11 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 Attorney General ex rel. Common Council v. Marx · Breen v. Pangborn · McFarlan v. McFarlan · Lloyd v. Chambers · Hartz v. Judge
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 11 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“"Administration of the estate of a person dying intestate shall be granted to some one or more of the persons hereinafter mentioned, and they shall be respectively entitled to the same in the following order: "1. The widow, husband or next of kin, or a grantee of the interest of one or more of them, or such of them as the judge of probate may think proper, or such person or persons as the widow, husband, next of kin or grantee may request to have appointed, if suitable and competent to discharge the trust. ’ ’”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage“‘ ‘ This statute gives to the widow not only priority amongst relatives who may be appointed but also priority amongst those who may request the appointment .of some other person. Whenever the question has arisen this court has emphasized that right. * * * "All presumptions are in favor of the person to whom the statute gives preference. Ex parte Small, 69 S. C. 43 ( 48 S. E. 40 ). The widow is presumed under her statutory right to be competent and suitable, and is presumptively entitled to her choice as to who should administer her husband’s estate. Grece v. Helm, 91 Mich. 450 . It follows that the burden of proof rests on those contending to the contrary. That some discretion rests in the probate court there can be no doubt. If a fair issue of fact was raised by the evidence of those denying the widow’s competency because of unsound mind, lack of normal understanding or average intelligence, intemperance, dishonesty or want of integrity, dissolute habits or other disqualifying moral delinquencies, the discretion of the probate court can readily be conceded. No such questions are raised here. ’ ’”
1 later decision quote this exact passage
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.