Butler v. Carpenter’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

18 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 21 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““The third ground of demurrer — ‘That defendant’s alleged equitable title is stale, and barred by the statute of limitations’: — may also be disposed of by the simple suggestion that the sole purpose of the statute of limitations, by its very language, is to toar actions, and not to suppress or deny matters of defense, whether equitable or legal; and that, too, when, as in this case, the equitable defense is accompanied by a prayer for affirmative relief. The purpose of the statute is to quiet the assertion of old, stale, and antiquated demands, but it has never been thought that its • intended object was to. go further, and to deny a just and meritorious defense, whether the facts of that defense had their birth in the first, tenth, or twentieth year before the call for the assertion of those facts was made necessary by some hostile claim, demand or proceeding. A ground of defense never becomes stalte or barred by the statute of limitations, but grows in strength and force as the limitation period against a right of action widens. The statute of limitations may be used by a deendant as a shield for his protection or defense, but is never to be turned upon him as a sword with which to compass his defeat.””

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. Harn v. Smith · Clark v. Duncanson