Schofield v. Schofield’s Empirical Analysis
1967
Citation profile
6 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 6 later decisions — most recently March 1986
6 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 Addy v. Addy · Bouska v. Bouska · Sorenson v. Sorenson · Gerk Ex Rel. Gerk v. Gerk · Pappas v. Pappas
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 6 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“At the time of defendant’s first visit [following his discharge from the military] the matter of Robert Bogart, plaintiff’s second husband, adopting the boy was discussed but defendant refused his consent. At the time of another visit to the boy by the defendant ... plaintiff wanted the adoption “and that was the only thing she wanted.” Defendant testified that at this second meeting plaintiff made it clear she didn’t want anything but the adoption and she wasn’t interested in the money. Payment was behind at that time. Plaintiff at that time did not want defendant visiting the boy. In May of 1963, a summons from a Missouri court concerning collection of the back child support payments was served on defendant’s mother in his absence. Defendant states that he immediately called plaintiff. The pertinent part of that conversation follows: “Q. And what did she say? A. She said yes, she had a summons out for this back child support, and I asked her just what exactly did she want and then she proceeded to make it quite clear that there was only one thing she wanted and this was an adoption. And, it was pretty evident to me that the — that this pressure she was trying to bring on this summons was an attempt to force me to sign this thing....[”] Defendant said that he received the prepared “Consent of Natural Father to Adoption” by mail from plaintiff’s attorney, signed it, had it notarized and returned it to the attorney in late July 1963_ Defendant heard no more from plaintiff unti”
1 later decision quote this exact passage“[immediately after delivering the consent to adoption to plaintiff defendant was no longer asked by formal proceedings or otherwise, for support money. He was not contacted at all until November of 1965, 2V2 years later, when plaintiff telephoned him to remind him of his duty to support the boy. That this telephone conversation coincided exactly with plaintiff’s divorce from her second husband would appear to be an important circumstance. ... For some reason the adoption was not completed and plaintiff then sought to turn back to defendant because, while she had the consent to adoption, she and her second husband had not used it.”
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.