Read v. Patterson’s Empirical Analysis
1888
Citation profile
3 federal appellate · 1 district · 23 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 30 later decisions — most recently February 1971 · most notably Colvin v. Goldenberg (1971), Swetland v. Swetland (1926)
3 federal appellate · 1 district · 23 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 Conover v. Guarantee Trust Co. · John Dandridge v. Martha Washington's Executors · Brown v. Ricketts · Beach v. President of the Fulton Bank
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 30 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“Where the power given to trustees is wholly discretionary to do or not to do a particular thing, in their discretion, the court has no jurisdiction to lay a command or prohibition upon the trustees as to the exercise of that power, provided their conduct be bona fide , and their determination is not influenced by improper motives. 2 Lewin on Trusts ( 8th ed. ) 612. Where the power is coupled with a trust or duty, the court will enforce a proper and timely exercise of the power; but if it be given upon a trust to be exercised in the discretion or upon the judgment of the trustee, the court will not interfere with the trustee's discretion in executing the trust, unless he has exercised his discretion mala fide.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
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.