Columbus Southern Ry Co v. Wright’s Empirical Analysis
151 U.S. 470 · 1894
Citation profile
2 federal appellate · 8 district · 43 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 106 later decisions (20 by the Supreme Court) — most recently January 1983 · most notably Lindsley v. Natural Carbonic Gas Co. (1911), Gulf Ry Co v. Ellis (1897)
2 federal appellate · 8 district · 43 state decisions — followed in 16 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 State Railroad Tax Cases Taylor Collector et al. v. Secor et al. · Minneapolis St Ry Co v. Beckwith · Cincinnati, New Orleans & Texas Pacific Railroad v. Commonwealth · Charlotte Co v. Gibbes
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 106 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“* * * value cannot be determined by ascertaining the value of the land included in the roadway assessed at the market price of adjacent lands, and adding the value of cross-ties, rails and spikes. The value of land depends largely upon the use to which it can be put, and the character of the improvements upon it. The assessable value, for taxation, of a railroad track can only be determined by looking at the elements on which the financial condition of the company depends * * *.”
5 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority““The whole complaint made by the plaintiff in error is that it had a constitutional right to have its rolling stock, and other unlocated personal property, taxed in the county of Muskogee, where it had its principal office, and to give such property a different situs,' under the act complained of, by distributing it among the counties through which the road extended, was an unjust discrimination, and violated its constitutional rights. This proposition cannot be entertained for a moment, for the reason already stated, that it was clearly within the province of the Legislature of Georgia, to give such personal property a different situs, for purposes of taxation, from that of the company’s principal office.””
1 later decision 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.