Mather v. Rillston’s Empirical Analysis
156 U.S. 391 · 1895
Citation profile
57 federal appellate · 5 district · 59 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 137 later decisions (3 by the Supreme Court) — most recently April 1957 · most notably Johnson v. Southern Pacific Co. (1904), Curtis v. McNair (1903)
57 federal appellate · 5 district · 59 state decisions — followed in 17 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.
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 137 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““All occupations i>roducing articles or works of necessity, nil lit I 1 venionce may undoubtedly be carried on, and competent persons, On, '.p" the business and having sufficient skill therein, may properly be m| .-A upon them; but in such cases where the occupation is attended *iv,h danger to life, body, or limb it is incumbent on the promoters thereof a:nd the employers of others thereon to take all reasonable and needed pi-cejuLions to secure safety to the persons engaged in their prosecution, and, for any negligence in this respect, from which injury follows to the nerum t ' «gaged, the promoters or tho employers may be held responsible and mulcíoá to the extent of the injury inflicted. The explosive nature o*' the s mterials used in this case, and the constant danger of their explosion from, heat or collision, as already explained, was well known to the eipployevn, ssud was a continuing admonition to them to take every precaution to guaní aso lust explosions. Occupations, however important, which cannot be comioctert without necessary danger to life, body, or limb, should not be prosecuted at all without all reasonable precautions against such dangers afforded by science. The necessary danger attending them should operate as a prohibition to (heir pursuit without such safeguards. Indeed, we think it may be laid down as a legal principle that in all occupations which are attended with great and unusual danger there must be used all appliances readily attainable known t”
18 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.