Packet Company v. St Louis’s Empirical Analysis
100 U.S. 423 · 1879
Citation profile
6 district · 21 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 74 later decisions (16 by the Supreme Court) — most recently December 2018 · most notably Edye v. Robertson (1884), John Hendrick v. State of Maryland (1915)
6 district · 21 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 Packet Company v. Keokuk · Cannon v. New Orleans
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 74 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““* * * To determine whether the charge prescribed by the ordinance in question is a duty of tonnage, within the meaning of the Constitution, it is necessary to observe carefully its object and essence. If the charge is clearly a duty, a tax or burden, which in its essence is a contribution claimed for the privilege of entering the port of Keokuk, or remaining in it, or departing from it, imposed as it is, by authority of the State and measured by the capacity of the vessel, it is, doubtless, embraced by the constitutional prohibition of such a duty. But a charge for services rendered or for conveniences provided is in no sense a tax or a duty. It is not a hindrance or impediment to free navigation. The prohibition to the State against the imposition of a duty of tonnage was designed to guard against local hindrances to trade and carriage by vessels, not to relieve them from liability to claims for assistance rendered and facilities furnished for trade and commerce.””
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority“Nor is there any ground whatever to suppose that these wharfage fees were exacted for the purpose of increasing the general revenue of the city beyond what was necessary to meet its outlay, from time to time, in maintaining its wharves in such condition as the immense business of that locality required.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority“paid as compensation for the use of an improved wharf and not for the mere privilege of entering or stopping at the Port of St. Louis or for landing at the shore, in its natural condition, where there were no conveniences which could be called a wharf”
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.