Schupbach v. Schupbach’s Empirical Analysis
1988
Citation profile
15 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 15 later decisions — most recently September 2012
15 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 Murphy v. Carron · Grace v. Perry · Winkel v. Streicher · Coleman v. Haworth · Briant v. Garrison
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 15 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““ [A]mbiguity’ means ‘duplicity, indistinctness or uncertainty of meaning of an expression used in a written instrument.’ ” An ambiguity in a ... trust may be either patent or latent. A patent ambiguity occurs when the duplicity, indistinctness, or uncertainty of meaning appears on the face of the instrument being considered, which, in this case, would be on the face of ... the trust agreement. A latent ambiguity occurs when the instrument being considered is unambiguous on its face but becomes open to more than one interpretation when applied to the factual situation in issue....”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage“In cases where a latent ambiguity exists, not only is evidence of surrounding facts and circumstances admissible, but, in addition, testimony regarding declarations made by the testator concerning such matters as the identity of a beneficiary, the identity or ambiguously described property, or to rebut some equity or presumption is also admissible.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passagee.g. In Re Johnson · In Re Nelson“A patent ambiguity is one on the face of the instrument, whereas a latent ambiguity occurs where the instrument itself is unambiguous on its face but becomes open to more than one interpretation when applied to the factual situation in issue.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passagee.g. In Re Johnson · In Re Nelson
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.