Vidal v. Commagére’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

17 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 20 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““We are to suppose that the Legislature intended to confer some substantial right by its action; for it cannot be presumed that a formal exertion of the sovereign power was made for a trivial purpose. “Now, if this formal act is to be construed. to confer merely a right to take the orphan into the family to reside, it gives it, as we think, a slight significance. It was a right with which no one would likely interfere, even in the absence of any action of the sovereign power.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Alexander v. Gray

2. ““ Under the Roman law, the person adopted entered into the family, and came under the power of the person adopting him. And the effect was such, that the person adopted stood not only himself in relation of child to him- adopting, but his children became the grandchildren of such person.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Gray v. Holmes

3. ““We conclude, therefore, that as, by the common acceptation of the word ‘adoption,’ the relationship of parent and child, with all the consequences of that relationship, is understood, as such was the legal meaning of the word under the former laws of Louisiana.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Cunningham v. Lawson