Grinnell v. Railroad Co.’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

11 federal appellate · 14 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 87 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““Another point equally fatal to the plaintiffs in error is, that the assertion of a right by the United States to the lands in controversy was wholly a matter between the government and the railroad company, or its grantors. The legal title remains where it was placed before the act of 1864. If the government desires to be reinvested with it, it must be done by some judicial proceeding, or by some act of the government asserting its right. It does not lie in the mouth of every one who chooses to settle on these lands to set up a title which the government itself can only assert by some direct proceeding. These plaintiffs had no right to stir up a litigation which the parties interested did not desire to be started. It might be otherwise if the legal title was in the government.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Spokane & British Columbia Railway Co. v. Washington & Great Northern Railway Co.