Maddock v. Magone’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

23 federal appellate · 7 district · 3 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 102 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““In Cadwalader v. Zeh, 151 U. S. 171 , 176, 14 Sup. Ct. 288 , 38 L. Ed. 115 , it was said that ‘it has long been a settled rule of interpretation of the statutes imposing duties on imports that if words used therein to designate particular kinds or classes of goods have a well-known signification in our trade and commerce, different from their ordinary meaning among the people, the commercial meaning is to prevail, unless Congress has clearly manifested a contrary intention; and that it is only when no commercial-meaning is called for or proved that the common meaning of the words is to be adopted.’ But it is also true that, as observed by Mr. Chief Justice Waite in Swan v. Arthur, 103 U. S. 597 , 598, 26 L. Ed. 525 : ‘While tariff acts are generally to be construed according to the commercial understanding of the terms employed, language will be presumed to have the same meaning in commerce that it has in ordinary use, unless the contrary is shown.’ “The Inquiry was whether, in a commercial sense, the articles were so knowu, trafficked In, and used, under the denomination of toys, that Congress, in the use of the particular word, should be xiresumed to have had that designation in mind as covering such articles. “Necessarily the commercial designation is the result of established usage in commerce and trade, and such usage, to affect a general enactment, must be definite, uniform, and'general, and not partial, local, or personal.””

   3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Woolworth v. United States · Schoverling, Daly & Gales v. United States

2. ““But tbe difficulty is tfiat if tfiese articles were only so known in one trade or branch of trade, or in one part of tlie country, — partially and locally, and not uniformly and-generally, — the conclusion announced by the instruction would not follow. Recovery should not be had on a theory involving different rates of duty at different ports of ehtry, or distinct and differing designations. Plaintiff did not attempt to prove that the articles were handled by toy houses, though evidence was adduced by him that they were known as ‘toys,’ and bought and sold as ‘toy plates,’ ‘toy teas,’ and ‘toy cans,’ but not by toy dealers, according to defendant’s evidence; and if it were admitted that their signification as toys was confined to a particular locality, or to a particular class, as, for instance, to those who imported them (in which case there might be danger that the designation would vary with the rates), and not to those who dealt in them, and that a different meaning obtained elsewhere, or among the latter, then the usage relied on would fail to be made out.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Carson v. Nixon

3. “in construing a tariff act, when it is claimed that the commercial use of a word or phrase in it differs from the ordinary signification of such word or phrase, in order that the former prevail over the latter it must appear that the commercial designation is the result of established usage in commerce and trade, and that at the time of the passage of the act that usage was definite, uniform, and general, and not partial, local, or personal.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Sonn v. Magone