State v. Baldwin’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

4 district · 86 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 90 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “Rules of construction are not laws, hard and inflexible, which must be applied in a given situation simply because it is possible to do so ... . [A] statute is to be construed as to carry out the legislative intent, though [it] may seem contrary to . . . the letter of the statute or its literal sense.. .. [W] e are not confined to a literal interpretation of the statutory language. . . . [T]he plain and ordinary meaning rules are no more than that; they can be disregarded in an appropriate case like any of the other rules of construction.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Hill v. Conway

2. “[i]f the rule were otherwise a trial judge would be tied to obvious errors even when, as here, the earlier rulings were made by a different judge. The trial judge would moreover be rendered helpless in the face of additional evidence or other considerations developing during trial of the case which might otherwise dictate a modification or a reversal of the preliminary rulings.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. State v. Bruno

3. ““Fresh pursuit” ... includes fresh pursuit as defined by the common law, and also the pursuit of a suspected violator of the criminal laws or other laws of this state, for which he is, or might be, subject to arrest, by an enforcement officer. Fresh pursuit ... is not necessarily instant pursuit, but pursuit without unreasonable delay____”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. State v. Griffin