Morris v. Lusk’s Empirical Analysis
1918
Citation profile
5 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 5 later decisions — most recently May 1976
5 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 Nolan v. New York, New Haven & Hartford Railroad · Atchison Topeka & Santa Fé Railroad v. Hague · Land v. St. Louis & San Francisco Railroad · Central Branch Union Pacific Rld. v. Henigh · Mason v. Missouri Pacific Railway Co.
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 5 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““The rate of speed through such a country could hardly he regarded as excessive towards any one, hut if it had been so as to persons rightfully on the track, it could not be a violation of duty to a trespasser whose presence was not within reasonable anticipation. Neither was the failure of the trainmen to keep a lookout along the track all of the time, or a failure to have discovered the child at the earliest possible moment, a violation of their duty to him. (Nolan v. N. York, N. Haven & Hartford R. R. Co., 53 Conn. 461 ; Note, 32 L. R. A., n. s., 564.) The men in charge of the train are not required to guard against a danger which is not to be anticipated, and under the circumstances of this case they owed the injured child no duty until they saw him on the track and in a place of danger. All the facts show, and the finding of the jury is, that the engineer shut off the steam, applied the emergency brakes, and did all in his power to save the little one as soon as he was discovered on the track. Liability of the defendants for such an injury can only result from a violation of their duty to the injured child, and since it has been established that no duty to it was violated no recovery can be had against the defendants for the lamentable accident.” (p. 225.)”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority““. . . The trainmen had no more reason to anticipate the presence of children on the track than of adults, and the company owed no higher duty to the child until its danger was discovered than if he had been an adult. . . .” (p. 224.)”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority“"... A lookout, of course, must be kept for persons upon public crossings, and likewise for the safety of persons passing on or over certain parts of the track by license or permission. ..." (l.c. 224.) (Emphasis supplied.)”
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.