13 Cal. 3d 349 - Smith v. Lewis’s Empirical Analysis
1975
Citation profile
14 federal appellate · 18 district · 298 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 351 later decisions — most recently June 2014 · most notably 23 Cal. 3d 412 - People v. Pope (1979), 15 Cal. 3d 838 - In Re Marriage of Brown (1976)
14 federal appellate · 18 district · 298 state decisions — followed in 20 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.
Relationships
Relies on 46 Cal. 2d 818 - People v. Watson · People v. Ibarra · 56 Cal. 2d 583 - Lucas v. Hamm · 6 Cal. 3d 920 - Nestle v. City of Santa Monica · Wissner v. Wissner
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 351 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““As the jury was correctly instructed, an attorney does not ordinarily guarantee the soundness of his opinions and, accordingly, is not liable for every mistake he may make in his practice. He is expected, however, to possess knowledge of those plain and elementary principles of law which are commonly known by well informed attorneys, and to discover those additional rules of law which, although not commonly known, may readily be found by standard research techniques. ... If the law on a particular subject is doubtful or debatable, an attorney will not be held responsible for failing to anticipate the manner in which the uncertainty will be resolved. . . . But even with respect to an unsettled area of the law, we believe an attorney assumes an obligation to his client to undertake reasonable research in an effort to ascertain relevant legal principles and to make an informed decision as to a course of conduct based upon an intelligent assessment of the problem. In the instant case, ample evidence was introduced to support a jury finding that defendant failed to perform such adequate research into the question of the community character of retirement benefits and thus was unable to exercise the informed judgment to which his client was entitled.” Id., 13 Cal. 3d at 358-59 . (Citations omitted.)”
9 later decisions quote this exact passage“An attorney ... is expected ... to possess knowledge of those plain and elementary principles of law which are commonly known by well-informed attorneys, and to discover those additional rules of law which, although not commonly known, may readily be found by standard research techniques.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage“[e]ven as to doubtful matters, an attorney is expected to perform sufficient research....”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage
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.