An oral authorization is sufficient for any purpose, except that an authority to enter into a contract, other than a negotiable instrument, required by law to be in writing can only be given by an instrument in writing.
S.D. Codified Laws § 59-2-3
Form of authority
Applied in 4 court decisions — leading case Staab v. Skoglund (1975)
Most recently applied in Melstad v. Kovac (October 2006)
Source: CivC 1877, § 1348; CL 1887, § 3971; RCivC 1903, § 1667; RC 1919, § 1249; SDC 1939, § 3.0204.
How often courts cite this section
Court decisions citing this, by year. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.
Official source: South Dakota Legislature. Reproduced from public-domain South Dakota statutes; confirm against the official source for the current text. Not legal advice.