Bemis v. Converse’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

29 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 30 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““It is strongly argued that the intention of the settlor and testator cannot have been that the entire burden of a tax of this nature should fall upon his estate and the property held under the trust deed be completely exonerated. Courts cannot speculate concerning the intention of settlors and testators as to where they intend the burden of taxes to rest. The instrument as written must govern. Opportunity is freely open in framing trust deeds and wills to make full and accurate expression of desire and intention respecting the payment of taxes and the particular beneficiaries whose shares shall be exonerated from or bear that pecuniary exaction for the support of government. Specific provision on this point is familiar in wills and is not infrequently found in other instruments. In the absence of a definite declaration on the subject it must be presumed that the intention was that the ultimate weight of taxation must rest where the law places it. It cannot be presumed that anything else was intended than what is stated in the written instrument. It may be, for aught that now can be known, that the precise result which has happened was intended. There is no jurisdiction in equity to prescribe what may seem fairer than the settlor or testator has declared. To do that is as foreign to chancery principles as to remold a will in order to make it conform to different conceptions of justice or fairness from those indulged by the testator.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 32 Wash. 2d 696 - Seattle-First National Bank v. MacOmber