Griffen v. . Manice’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

18 federal appellate · 5 district · 281 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 312 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““If a passenger in a car is injured by striking the seat in front of him, that, of itself, authorizes no inference of negligence. If it be shown, however, that he was precipitated against the seat by reason of the train coming in collision with another train, or in consequence of the car being derailed, the presumption of negligence arises. The res, therefore, includes the attending circumstances, and, so defined, the application of the rule presents principally the question of the sufficiency of circumstantial evidence to establish, or to justify the jury in inferring, the existence of the traversable or principal fact in issue, the defendant’s negligence. The maxim is also in part based on the consideration that, where the management and control of the thing which has produced the injury is exclusively vested in the defendant, it is within his power to produce evidence of the actual cause that produced the accident, which the plaintiff is unable to present. Neither of these rules — that a fact may be proved by circumstantial evidence as well as by direct, and that where the defendant has knowledge of a fact hut slight evidence is requisite to shift on him the burden of explanation — is confined to any particular class of cases, but they are general rules of evidence applicable wherever issues of fact are to be determined, either in civil or criminal actions.” ' Nebraska Bridge Supply & Humber .Company v. Jeffery, 169 Fed. 609 , 95 C. C. A. 137 .”

   6 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. Chicago, M. & St. P. Ry. Co. v. Irving · Colligan v. 680 Newark Avenue Realty Corp.

2. ““In no instance can the bare fact that an injury'has happened, of itself and divorced from all the surrounding circumstances, justify the inference that the injury was caused by negligence. It is true that direct proof of negligence is not necessary. Like any other fact, negligence may be established by the proof of circumstances from which its existence may be inferred. . . . This phrase (res ipsa loquitur), which literally translated means that ‘the thing speaks for itself,’ is merely a short way of saying that the circumstances attendant upon an accident are themselves of such a character as to justify a jury in inferring negligence as the cause of that accident.” (p. 55.)”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Mayes v. Kansas City Power & Light Co.

3. ““There is another rule which the plaintiff asks me to call your attention, and I am going to call to your .attention the rule that where an accident happens which, in the ordinary course of business, would not happen if the required degree of care was observed, the presumption is that such care was wanting, and if you find in this case that this accident was one which, in the ordinary course of business, would not have happened if the required degree of care was observed, you have a right to presume that such care was wanting.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Anderson v. McCarthy Dry Goods Co.