Coplin v. Anderson’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

2 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 2 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “The typed words “Lillian Burke” and “Testatrix” were added to the second page after it was signed. 84 O.S.1971, § 55, as amended, provides: Every will, other than a noncupative will, must be in writing; and every will, other than a holographic will and a non-cupative will, must be executed and attested as follows: 1. It must be subscribed at the end thereof by the testator himself, or some person, in his presence and by his direction, must subscribe his name thereto. 2. The subscription must be made in the presence of the attesting witnesses, or be acknowledged by the testator to them, to have been made by him or by his authority. 3. The testator must, at the time of subscribing or acknowledging the same, declare to the attesting witnesses that the instrument is his will. 4. There must be two attesting witnesses, each of whom must sign his name as a witness at the end of the will at the testator’s request and in his presence.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Matter of Estate of Burke

2. “In accord with the view entertained by most courts that the end of a will is the end of the testamentary dispositions there set forth, our Legislature in enacting Section 55, supra, did not intend nor purport to specify the exact line or place at such end where the signature had to appear to be competent and sufficient as a subscription; and when the testator’s signature appears at such end, then the statutory requirement as to its location on the document is met. . . . Here the testator not only subscribed his name at what he apparently thought was “the end” of the will, but in fact subscribed it at the end of his testamentary dispositions, which, as we have seen, is the equivalent of the “end of the will” within the logical and reasonable rule above referred to, and within the meaning we think was intended by our Legislature.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Matter of Estate of Burke