Mackall v. Casilear’s Empirical Analysis
137 U.S. 556 · 1890
Citation profile
27 federal appellate · 19 district · 69 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 171 later decisions (12 by the Supreme Court) — most recently October 2009 · most notably Hammond v. Hopkins (1892), Penn Mut Life Ins Co v. City of Austin (1898)
27 federal appellate · 19 district · 69 state decisions — followed in 23 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 Antoine Michoud v. Peronne Bernardine Girod · Elmendorf v. Taylor · Sullivan v. Portland and Kennebec Railroad Company · Godden v. Kimmell · Hayward v. National Bank
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 171 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“The doctrine of laches is based upon grounds of public policy, which require for the peace of society the discouragement of stale demands. And where the difficulty of doing entire justice by reason of the death of the principal witness or witnesses, or from the original transactions having become obscured by time, is attributable to gross negligence or deliberate delay, a court of equity will not aid a party whose application is thus destitute of conscience, good faith and reasonable diligence.”
6 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“The doctrine of laches is based upon grounds of public policy, which require for the peace of society discouragement of stale demands. And where the difficulty of doing entire justice by reason of death of the principal witness or witnesses, or from the original transaction having become obscured by time, is attributable to gross negligence or deliberate delay, a court of equity will not aid a party whose application is thus destitute of conscience, good faith and reasonable diligence. [Citations omitted.]”
1 later decision 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.