In the Matter of Arthur J Halpern Chase Manhattan Bank Objectant’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

1 district ·

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

1. “Intent to conceal the financial condition is no longer a necessary element to support an objection to a discharge for failure to keep books. The law ... does not require ... any special form of accounts. It is a question in each instance of reasonableness in the particular circumstances. Complete disclosure is in every case a condition precedent to the granting of the discharge, and if such a disclosure is not possible without the keeping of books or records, then the absence of such amounts to that failure to which the act applies. While it is always open to the bankrupt to affirmatively justify his failure to keep records, each case must stand upon its own facts with the inquiry always as to whether the bankrupt has sustained this burden of jurisdiction which the statute places upon him for his failure to keep adequate records.... The purpose and intent of section [727(a)(3) of the Bankruptcy Code] is to make the privilege of discharge dependent on a true presentation of the debtor’s financial affairs. It was never intended that a bankrupt, after failure, should be excused from his indebtedness without showing an honest effort to reflect his entire business and not a part merely.”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Novak v. Blonder (In Re Blonder) · Pereira v. Young (In Re Young)

2. ““Whether failure to keep books should bar a discharge in bankruptcy is ‘a question in which instance of reasonableness in the particular circumstances.’ ... To meet this test, the bankrupt must show that a failure to keep books comports with the ‘vague, but imperative, dictates of ordinary fair dealing, or common caution . . .’ . . .In most cases, the complexity of the bankrupt’s business activities determines whether he should have maintained books . . . But, as we noted in Morris Plan Indus. Bank of New York v. Dreher, 144 F.2d 60, 61 (2d Cir. 1944), this ‘is a loose test, concerned with the practical problems of wRat can be expected of the type of person and type of business involved.’ For example, in Dreher, an ‘itinerant peddler of rags and old clothes,’ who had incurred debts over a decade earlier, was granted a discharge because people in his business would not ordinarily keep books. Similarly, in In re Pinko, 94 F.2d 259, 261 (7th Cir. 1938), a mere salaried employee was held not required to keep books. In that case, the books of an earlier construction business run by the bankrupt were in the possession of his former wife; his failure to place them before the referee was excused because the objecting creditor had ‘made no effort to require their production . . ’ See also In re Lepine, 4 F.Supp. 808 (E.D.N.Y.1933), aff’d per curiam, 70 F.2d 1017 (2d Cir. 1934); In re Weisman, 1 F.Supp. 723 (S.D.N.Y.1932); cf. Morris Plan Indus. Bank v. Henderson, 131 F.2d 975 (2d Cir.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. In re Sheehan