Weatherly v. Purcell’s Empirical Analysis
1950
Citation profile
2 federal appellate · 14 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 16 later decisions — most recently February 1997
2 federal appellate · 14 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 Carter Oil Company v. Weil · Coffelt v. Decatur School District No. 17 · Beasley v. Shinn · Beard v. Dansby · Dempsey v. Davis
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.
““The evidence in the present case indicates without question that up until 1946 everyone who had anything to do with the land assumed that the 1889 deed conveyed a fee simple title to John E. Purcell. John E. Purcell executed a deed in 1930 purporting to convey a fee simple to Weatherly. That gave Weatherly ‘color of title’ within the meaning of the Betterments Act. * * * It is not necessary now to review all the evidence introduced; it suffices to say that when Weatherly made the improvements upon the land for which he now seeks reimbursement, he had no idea that he owned only an estate pur autre vie while John E. Purcell lived. He peaceably improved the land while in possession under color of title believing himself to be the owner in fee simple. ’ ’”
1 later decision quote this exact passagee.g. Lawrence v. Lawrence
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.