Miller v. Letzerich’s Empirical Analysis
1932
Citation profile
5 federal appellate · 76 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 90 later decisions — most recently March 2012 · most notably Kraft v. Langford (1978), Duenow v. Lindeman (1947)
5 federal appellate · 76 state decisions
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 90 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“(a) No person may divert or impound the natural flow of surface waters in this state, or permit a diversion or impounding by him to continue, in a manner that damages the property of another by the overflow of the water diverted or impounded. (b) A person whose property is injured by an overflow of water caused by an unlawful diversion or impounding has remedies at law and in equity and may recover damages occasioned by the overflow.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“[I]t is apparent when one wrongfully diverts surface water and causes it to flow over another’s land, causing damage, his acts are within the prohibitory terms of the statute, and a cause of action arises.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“These rights of the owners of estates under the civil law are appurtenant to and a part of the land itself, and passed to them with the grants. The right of the owner of the upper estate to have the surface waters falling thereon to pass in their natural condition on to the lands of the lower estate is a servitude or natural right in the nature of an easement over the lower estate of his neighbor. It is a right of property, which inheres in the estate entitled to its benefit independent of any contractual or prescriptive right. The right comes clearly within the accepted definitions of and has every essential quality of an easement, although, as stated before, it arises out of nature itself, and, as we have seen, was adopted and enforced by the doctrines of the civil law. The right, being an easement, is a part of the realty itself, an interest in land, and is governed by the rules of law with reference to real property. The right, being a natural easement, arising out of the relationship of the dominant and servient estates, and being a part of the grants made by the sovereign to the owners of the estates, it is a vested right, protected by the Constitution.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
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.