Clementson v. Williams’s Empirical Analysis
12 U.S. 72 · 1814
Citation profile
5 federal appellate ·
How this case has been cited
Cited by 17 later decisions (5 by the Supreme Court) — most recently September 1985
5 federal appellate ·
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.
Relationships
Relies on Montgomery Bell v. James Morrison Anthony Butler and Jonathan Taylor · William M'Cluny v. Wyllis Silliman · United States v. Wilder · Van Keuren v. . Parmelee · Purdy v. Austin
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 17 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“no promise, conditional or unconditional; but a simple acknowledgment. This acknowledgment goes to the original justice of the account; but this is not enough. The statute of limitations was not enacted to protect persons from claims fictitious in their origin, but from ancient claims, whether well or ill founded, which may have been discharged, but the evidence of discharge may be lost. It is not, then, sufficient to take the case out of the act, that the claim should be proved, or be acknowledged to have been originally just ; the acknowledgment must go to the fact that it is still due. In the case at bar, the acknowledgment of J. Clarke is, that he had not discharged the account presented to him, but he does not say that it was not discharged. ' His partner may have paid it without the knowledge of Clarke; and, consequently, the declaration of Clarke that he had not himself paid it, and that he did not know whether his partner had paid it or not, is no proof that the debt remains due, and, therefore, is not such an acknowledgment as will take the case out of the statute of limitations.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Wetzell v. Bussard“been frequently decided, that an acknowledgment of a debt barred by the statute of limitations, takes the case out of the statute, and revives the original cause of action. So far as decisions have gone on this point, principles may be considered as settled, and the Courts will not lightly unsettle them. But they have gone full as far as they ought to be carried, and this Court is not inclined to extend them. The statute of limitations is entitled to the same respect with other statutes, and “ought not to be explained away.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Wetzell v. Bussard
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.