Eckle v. Ryland’s Empirical Analysis
1914
Citation profile
2 federal appellate · 40 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 42 later decisions — most recently October 2001 · most notably Gardner v. Vanlandingham (1934), Elsea v. Smith (1918)
2 federal appellate · 40 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 Thurber v. . Chambers · Godman v. Simmons · Utter v. Sidman · Williamson v. Brown · O'Day v. Meadows
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 42 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“the general rule is that the word “heirs” has a “technical” or “artistic” meaning in wills.... Ordinarily it is [a] word of limitation as contradistinguished from one of purchase.... “The word ‘heirs’ will be considered as a word of limitation, and not of purchase, unless the will shows clearly that it is used to designate a new class of beneficiaries.””
1 later decision quote this exact passage“In a will, more than in deeds, and yet in the latter, the language used varies so materially and so much that precedents are rarely controlling in a concrete case except as they may furnish general aiding rules. Therefore the best interpretation of a will or deed is the instrument itself.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage“* * * the rule of law is that, when the intention of the grantor in a deed or the testator in a will is ascertained, then the bounden duty of a judge is to make that intention effective, unless, it contravenes some positive rule of law.”
1 later decision 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.