Weil v. Commissioner’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

11 federal appellate · 2 district · 4 state decisions

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

1. ““We think the controlling fact is that Weil proposed all the time to sell the stock and kept control of it to do so. He was not the guardian of the children, and it is conceded that under the law of Alabama he could not sell the property of his minor children. It is plain that he intended to give his children the benefit of the stock, and perhaps went to great pains to make it appear that he had done so before the profit was realized which would be taxed in solido if his, but in separate parts and less severely if his children’s; but all the time he intended to and did maintain dominion and control over the stock so as to sell it. Prior to the several sales, the certificates sold never passed out of his custody into the control of any other person; they were never indorsed to the children or put in their names, nor was any writing signed and delivered by him purporting to convey them. This retention of control for the purpose of exercising dominion over them by sale is inconsistent with a present absolute gift, the legal result of which would have been to prevent a sale. * * * Whether a father may deal wholly with himself for his child without writing, without co-operation of any third person who represents the child, without doing what is ordinarily done to transfer this kind of property and without parting with control over the certificate, we greatly doubt. Generally a donor must go as far as the nature of the property and the circumstances reasonably permit in parting wit”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. In Re Brown's Estate · Davis v. National Bank of Tulsa

2. ““There was here no valuable consideration and no basis for equity to construct a trust. If there was a trust, it must have been an express trust. The evidence to establish a voluntary express trust in personal property, must show a clear intention to create a trust. Equity will not make one where none has been clearly declared. A defective or imperfect gift will not be converted into a trust.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Davis v. National Bank of Tulsa