Bertig v. Norman’s Empirical Analysis
1911
Citation profile
2 federal appellate · 44 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 48 later decisions (2 by the Supreme Court) — most recently February 2005 · most notably Stevens v. The White City (1932), First National Bank of DeWitt v. Cruthis (2005)
2 federal appellate · 44 state decisions — followed in 13 states
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 Claflin v. . Meyer · St. L., I. M. & S. Ry. Co. v. Weakly · James v. Orrell · Union Compress Co. v. Nunnally · Stanley v. Bracht
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 48 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““It is urged by counsel for Bertig Brothers that the action as originally brought was one sounding in tort for the conversion of the property, and that the complaint could not be amended so as to base.the action upon a bailment. But we are of the opinion that the allegations of the complaint in the justice of the peace court, and as it was amended in the circuit court, were sufficient to make the action one of assumpsit. The action of assumpsit is one for the recovery of damages for the nonperformance of a simple contract. Such contract may be expressed or implied, and the action is based upon the breach thereof, and is therefore ex contractu. 2 Enc. PI. & Prac. 988. “Giving to the pleading that liberal construction accorded by our practice, the complaint as originally filed alleged that the defendants had obtained and converted the bale of cotton, and were liable to plaintiff upon an implied promise to pay for the value thereof thus received by them . . . Whether the breach of contract grew but of the failure to pay the proceeds of the bale upon an implied promise to do so by those who had obtained it, or but of the negligence of those who, as bailees, were entrusted with its care, the remedy was an action of assumpsit. Ferrier v. Wood, 9 Ark. 85 ; Stanley v. Bracht, 42 Ark. 210 . The action instituted was therefore based, and recovery can only be had, upon a contract of bailment and the breach thereof by the def endánts. ’ ’”
1 later decision quote this exact passage““This rule, however, does not obtain where the bailee does not have the exclusive possession of the property at the time of its loss. If the possession of the bailee is not actual and exclusive, or if the owner has such charge or possession thereof that he is equally able to show the facts, then it does not devolve upon the bailee to account for its loss or to show in effect that he was free from negligence.””
1 later decision 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.