Bolden v. Barnes’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

4 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 4 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““This act is said to be unconstitutional because the right to transfer the case is made conditional upon the appeal having been ‘properly brought up,’ and the investigation of the question whether the appeal has been, or not, ‘properly brought up,’ is itself an exercise of jurisdiction, so that the statute has undertaken to confer upon the appellate courts jurisdiction of cases of which under, the Constitution they have none. “This argument assumes that the court first determines whether it has jurisdiction of an appeal, and then considers whether the appeal has been brought up1, or, to use the language of the statute, ‘properly brought up.’ But the process is in the inverse order. The court determines, first, whether there is an appeal — that is to say, whether an appeal has been brought up, or, to use the language of the statute, ‘properly brought up’' — and, having found that there is an appeal to be dealt with, it proceeds to consider whether it has jurisdiction of it. If it finds that it has no jurisdiction of it, it dismisses it, or, under this statute, transfers it. We see in this transfer nothing more than making such a disposal of the appeal as requires no greater exercise of jurisdiction than would be required for a dismissal. “The court necessarily has jurisdiction for determining whether the appeal hhs been brought up; that is, whether the steps for bringing it up have been taken.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Kaufman v. H. G. Hill Stores, Inc.