Reynolds v. Witte’s Empirical Analysis
1880
Citation profile
2 federal appellate · 18 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 24 later decisions (2 by the Supreme Court) — most recently June 2013
2 federal appellate · 18 state decisions — followed in 11 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 McNeil v. . the Tenth National Bank · Foster v. President of the Essex Bank · Scott, Williams & Co. v. Crews
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 24 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““It is difficult to understand upon what ground the principal should he held liable lor the negligence of his agent, and not for his fraud, where the act is done or omitted to he done to the very property as to which the agency exists, and in tlie course of the agency. Fraud by which the property is lost is generally considered one of the forms of gross negligence. What is the proper understanding of the librase ‘within the scope of the- agency’ ? Does ‘the scope’ include negligence and exclude fraud? It cannot properly he restricted to what the parties intended In the creation of the agency: for that would also exclude negligence, as no agent is appointed for tlie purpose of being negligent, any more than for the purpose of acting fraudulently. The question cannot lie determined by tlie authority Intended to be conferred by the principal. We must distinguish between the authority io commit a fraudulent act, and the authority to transact the business in the course of which the fraudulent act was committed. Tested by reference to the intention of the principal neither negligence nor fraud is within ‘the scope of the agency’; but, tested by the connection of the act with the property and business of the agency, fraud In taking the very property is as much ‘within the scope of the agency’ as negligence in allowing others to take it. The proper inquiry is whether the act was done in the course of the agency, and by virtue of the authority as agent. If it was, then the principal i”
2 later decisions 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.