Pierrepont v. . Edwards’s Empirical Analysis
1862
Citation profile
1 federal appellate · 49 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 54 later decisions — most recently November 1960 · most notably In re the Estate of Smallman (1931), Delaney v. . Van Aulen (1881)
1 federal appellate · 49 state decisions — followed in 12 states
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.
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 54 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“"It will be seen, by an examination of them, that no positive rule, of ready application to every case, can be laid down, but that each case will depend upon a consideration of all the material provisions of the will to be construed, and of the extrinsic circumstances respecting the testator’s family and estate which may be fairly brought to bear upon the question of intent. The leading principle of the cases is that when the testator bequeaths a sum of money—or, which is the same thing, a life annuity—in such a manner as to show a separate and independent intention that the money shall be paid to the legatee at all events, that intention will not be permitted to be overruled merely by a direction in tire will that the money is to be raised in a particular way, or out of a particular fund.””
2 later decisions quote this exact passage““If we were to hold that the widow was to have nothing unless the property or securities in which the estate happened to be invested yielded income, and that she was not to be paid the full seven thousand dollars per annum, directed to be paid to her, unless the investment should happen to yield that sum, we "should, in my opinion, sacrifice the substance and primary intention of the will for the sake of an incidental provision inserted for the convenience of the estate, and not intended to limit or control, or to render uncertain or conditional, the provision in her favor."”
2 later decisions 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.