Baldrige v. Greiner’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

1 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 1 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““The legal principles upon which this case must be decided are well settled. They have been frequently announced by us, most recently in In Matter of Estate of Kruse, 250 N.W.2d 432, 433 (Iowa 1977), where we said: “ ‘The basic rules governing our consideration of this will are: (1) the testator’s intent is the polestar and must prevail; (2) the intent must be gathered from a consideration of all the language of the will, the scheme of distribution, and the facts and circumstances surrounding the making of the will; and (3) technical rules of construction should be resorted to only if the language of the will is clearly ambiguous or conflicting or testator’s intent is for any reason uncertain.’ * * * [Emphasis omitted]. * * * [citing authorities]. “Somewhat earlier we said in In Re Estate of Syverson, 239 Iowa 800, 804-805 , 32 N.W.2d 799, 801 (1948): “ ‘The intention of the testator must be ascertained from the will, itself, and from nothing else, if its language is plain and unambiguous. Where the intention is thus clearly and unequivocally expressed there is no need for judicial construction, or extrinsic evidence, and all other rules of testamentary interpretation are inapplicable and must yield. The intention must be that which is manifest from the express language of the will or by necessary implication.’ ””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Estate of Oxley v. Oxley