Spraigue v. Thompson’s Empirical Analysis
118 U.S. 90 · 1886
Citation profile
40 federal appellate · 10 district · 58 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 162 later decisions (21 by the Supreme Court) — most recently May 1986 · most notably Immigration & Naturalization Service v. Chadha (1983), Flint v. Stone Tracy Co. (1911)
40 federal appellate · 10 district · 58 state decisions — followed in 16 states
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.
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 162 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““It was held, however, by the Supreme Court of Georgia, in the case now before us, that so much of the section as makes these illegal exceptions may bo disregarded, so that the rest of the section as thus read may stand, upon the principle that a separable part of a statute, which is unconstitutional, may be rejected, and the remainder preserved and enforced. But the insuperable difficulty with the application of that, principle of construction to the present instance is that by rejecting the exceptions intended by the Legislature of Georgia the statute is made to enact; what confesedly the Legislature never meant. Tt confers upon the statute a positive operation beyond the legislative intent, and beyond what any one can say It would have enacted in view of the it legality of the exceptions.””
8 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“"In our recent decision of City of Mobile v. Salter, 287 Ala. 660 , 255 So.2d 5 , in dealing with a severability or separability clause, we cited Wilkinson v. Stiles, 200 Ala. 279 , 76 So. 45 , and Spraigue v. Thompson, 118 U.S. 90 , 6 S.Ct. 988 , 30 L.Ed. 115 , for the principle that `If a clause in a statute which violates the Constitution cannot be rejected without causing the act to enact what the Legislature never intended, the whole statute must fall.'”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage““No state or municipal government shall impose upon pilots of steam vessels any obligation to procure a state or other license in addition to that issued by the United States, or any other regulation which will impede such pilots in the performance of the duties required by this title; nor shall any pilot charges be levied by any such authority upon any steamer piloted as provided by this title. * * * Nothing in this title shall be construed to annul or affect any regulation established by the laws of any state, requiring vessels entering or leaving a port in any such state, other than coast-wise steam vessels, to take a pilot duly licensed or authorized by the laws of such state, or of a state situate upon the waters of such state.””
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. The Queen
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.