Sheridan v. Sheridan’s Empirical Analysis
1970
Citation profile
34 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 34 later decisions — most recently January 2002 · most notably Gratrix v. Gratrix (1982), Long v. Long (1991)
34 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 Merrill v. Merrill · Houger v. Houger · Rhodes v. Rhodes · Crume v. Crume · McSmith v. McSmith
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 34 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“"Judgments for custody. In an action for divorce or for legal separation the court may, during the pendency of the action, or at the final hearing or at any time thereafter during the minority of any child of the marriage, make an order for the custody of or visitation with the minor child which may seem necessary or proper and may at any time modify or vacate the order. In awarding custody the court is to be guided by the following considerations: (1) by what appears to be for the best interests of the child and if the child is of a sufficient age and intelligence to form a preference, the court may consider that preference in determining the question; (2) as between parents adversely claiming the custody neither parent is entitled to it as of right.””
4 later decisions quote this exact passagee.g. Lacy v. Lacy · King v. King“Child custody determinations are among the most difficult in the law. Grave responsibility is placed upon the trial courts faced with making these determinations and, at the same time, broad discretion is granted them. However, while ‘great weight must be accorded to the trial judge’s experience and to his evaluation of demeanor testimony,’ his discretion is not unlimited. On review we must determine whether that discretion has been abused, perhaps by assigning too great a weight to some factors while ignoring others, perhaps by elevating the interests of one of the parties to the dispute above that of the child, perhaps by making a clearly erroneous finding with respect to some material issue, or perhaps in some other manner. [footnote omitted]”
3 later decisions quote this exact passagee.g. Gratrix v. Gratrix · Lacy v. Lacy“It is well established that on appeal our task is to ascertain whether or not the trial court misapplied the broad discretion vested in it in regard to determination of custody questions, and whether the court’s findings in respect to custodial issues are clearly erroneous, (footnote omitted)”
3 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.