Bushnell v. Loomis’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

3 federal appellate · 27 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 32 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “There was no power in the husband to make a valid deed without the joinder of the wife. In an elaborate note to the case of McDonald v. Sanford, 9 Am. Eng. Ann. Cas. l.c. 14, the learned annotator thus summarizes the rule as well as the cases: `A conveyance of the homestead by the husband without the consent or joinder of his wife cannot operate by estoppel or otherwise against him, though it is executed by him voluntarily, and for a valuable consideration. It is simply void — a nullity, to all intents and purposes. . . . The statute in effect declares a conveyance or incumbrance of the family homestead by the husband alone void, not only as to the wife, but also as to the husband himself. Therefore neither is estopped from asserting the homestead right as against the grantee or mortgagee. Such is the view sanctioned by the clear weight of authority and supported by the soundest reasoning. To hold that such a conveyance could be enforced as against the husband while void as to the wife and children would not only be absurd in the extreme, but would be a flagrant usurpation of legislative powers. [Whitlock v. Gosson, 35 Neb. 829 .] Where a husband attempts to mortgage or alienate the homestead without the joinder of his wife, the instrument is void, and neither the husband nor the wife is estopped thereby to question the rights of the mortgagee or grantee therein.'”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Haines v. Carroll

2. ““From this basis let ns proceed to discuss the rights of the husband. To do so we must consider the purpose of the homestead acts. Such acts are founded upon a public policy. This public.policy was not to protect the single and unmarried man, but on the contrary, was to protect the married man, Ms wife and cMldren. The purpose was not to confer a privilege or a right upon the man as a man, but upon the man as a head of a family, and a member of an immediate family. If, therefore, we say that the wife has no vested right prior to the death of the husband, why should we say that the husband has a vested right of any character?””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Williams v. Williams