Tennessee Bond Cases Stevens v. Memphis & C. R. Co.’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

8 federal appellate · 2 district · 10 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 27 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““The Legislature of the state of Tennessee, on the 11th of February, 1852. enacted a law ‘to establish a system of internal improvements,’ in which ii was provided Hurt the state should issue to certain railroad companies therein named its negotiable coupon bonds, and that, when the respective roads should be completed, the state should be invested with a lion upon each road and its superstructure and equipment, ‘for the payment of all of said bonds issued to the company, as provided in this act, and for the interest accruing on .said bonds.’ Held, in view of other provisions in the act, and of -the practical construction. put upon it, that the lien thereby created was created to secure payment to the state of the amount of indebtedness it thus undertook to incur, and not pa^ ment to the holders of the state bonds tlms agreed to be issued; and that the state could accept payment in other mode or modes than those pointed ont hv the act or acts creating the lien, and could cause the property to he released from it, either by legislation, or by foreclosure under the statute, while the bonds issued to the company for the construction of tiie road released or foreclosed were still outstanding and unpaid.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Weil v. Alabama State Land Co.