Wise v. Watson’s Empirical Analysis
1970
Citation profile
89 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 89 later decisions — most recently August 2016 · most notably Thorne v. Thorne (1977), 54 Ala. App. 620 - Leigh v. Aiken (1975)
89 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 Butler v. Butler · Bridges v. Bridges · Williams v. Williams · Montgomery v. Montgomery · Coffey v. Cross
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 89 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“"Courts are to construe judgments as they construe written contracts, applying the same rules of construction they apply to written contracts. Whether a judgment is ambiguous is a question of law to be determined by the court. If the terms of a judgment are not ambiguous, then they must be given their usual and ordinary meaning and their `legal effect must be declared in the light of the literal meaning of the language used' in the judgment."”
4 later decisions quote this exact passage“"When equity's jurisdiction is invoked, minor children are wards of the court, and it is the court's duty to guard and protect the interest of its infant wards with scrupulous care.... In the case of divorce of the parents, equity courts have inherent power to protect the welfare of the minor children born of the broken marriage and to make appropriate allowances for them, ... and, having once obtained jurisdiction over the children of divorced parents, the court retains jurisdiction during their infancy. "”
3 later decisions quote this exact passagee.g. Clark v. Clark · Cosby v. Cosby“[I]t is the [equity] court's duty to guard and protect the interest of its infant wards with scrupulous care,”
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.