Pollard v. Vinton’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

56 federal appellate · 44 district · 60 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 217 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““A ‘bill of lading’ is an instrument well known in commercial transactions, and its character and effect have been defined by judicial decisions. In the hands of the holder it is evidence of ownership, special or general, of the property mentioned in it, and of the right to receive said property at the place of delivery. Notwithstanding it is designed to pass from hand to hand, with or without indorsement, and it is efficacious for its ordinary purposes in the hands of the holder, it is not a negotiable instrument or obligation in the sense that a bill of exchange or a promissory note is. Its transfer does not preclude, as in those cases, all inquiry into the transaction in which it originated, because it has come into hands of persons who have innocently paid value for it. The doctrine of bona fide purchasers only applies to it in a limited sense. “It is an instrument of a twofold character. It is at once a receipt and a contract. In the former character it is an acknowledgment of the receipt of property on board his vessel by the owner of the vessel. In the latter it is a contract to carry safely and deliver. The receipt of the goods lies at the foundation of the contract to carry and deliver. If no goods are actually received, there can be no valid contract to carry or to deliver.””

   14 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Friedlander v. Texas & Pacific Railway Co. · Missouri Pacific Railway Co. v. McFadden

2. ““Before the power to make and deliver a bill of lading could arise, some person must have shipped goods on the vessel. Only then could there be a shipper, and only then could there be goods shipped. In saying this, we do not mean that the goods must have been actually placed on the deck of the vessel. If they came within the control or the custody of the officers of the boat for the purpose of shipment, the contract of carriage had commenced, and the evidence of it, in the form of a bill of lading, would be binding; but without such a delivery there was no contract of carrying, and the agents of it had no authority to make one.””

   4 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Bennitt v. The Guiding Star · Pearce v. The Thomas Newton

3. ““Whatever may he the true rule which characterizes actions of officers of a corporaiion who are placed in control as the governing force of the corporation, which actions are at once a fraud on ihe corporation and the parties with whom Biey deal, and how far courts may yet decide to hold the corporations liable for such exercise of power by tlieir officers, they can have no controlling influence over cases like the present. In the one before ns it is a question of pure agency, and depends solely on the power confided to the agent. In the other ease the officer is the corporation for many purposes. Certainly a corporation can he charged with no intelligent action, or with entertaining any purpose, or committing any fraud, except as tliis intelli gence, this purpose, this fraud, is evidenced by the actions of its officers. .And. while it may be conceded that for many purposes they are agents, and are to be treated as the agents of the corporation or of the corporators, it is also true that for some purposes they are the corporation, and their acts as such officers are its acts. We do not think that case presents a rule for this case.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Dun v. City Nat. Bank of Birmingham