Fitzgerald v. Thompson’s Empirical Analysis
1949
Citation profile
2 federal appellate · 6 district · 21 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 31 later decisions — most recently March 2011 · most notably Lamb v. Hartford Accident & Indemnity Co. (1956), Ziegler v. Akin (1958)
2 federal appellate · 6 district · 21 state decisions
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 Dunn v. Jones · Henderson v. National Mutual Casualty Co. · Burks v. Aldridge · State Highway Commission v. American Mutual Liability Insurance · O'Leary v. . Board of Education of the City of New York
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 31 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““The rule deducible from the above authorities is that the liability assumed by the insurer is neither a contract liability nor a statutory liability. It is a tort liability — the liability in tort which the insured has ‘from the negligent operation’ of his business under the permit. The fact that this tort liability is determined by the statute and by the insurance policy does not keep it from being a tort liability. “If the petition states a cause of action in tort against the permit holder and alleges the filing and approval of the liability policy it states a cause of action against the insurer. This is the basis for the holdings of the court that one who sustains injury in his person or property by the negligent operation under the permit of the permit holder may sue both the permit holder and the insurer, or either one of them, and the action is in tort, not in contract.” (pp. 90, 91.)”
7 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority““(a) Except as provided in subsection (b), no certificate, permit, or license shall be issued by the state corporation commission to any ‘public motor carrier of property,’ ‘public motor carrier of passengers,’ ‘contract motor carrier of property or passengers,’ or ‘private motor carrier of property,’ until and after such applicant shall have filed with, and the same has been approved by the state corporation commission, a liability insurance policy, in such reasonable sum as the commission may deem necessary to adequately protect the interest of the public with due regard to the number of persons and amount of property involved, but in no event shall such sum be less than five thousand dollars ($5,000) for loss to property of others in any one accident, twenty-five thousand dollars ($25,000) for personal injury or death to any one person in any one accident, and fifty thousand dollars ($50,000) for injury or death to two or more persons in any one accident, which liability insurance shall bind the obligors thereunder to pay compensation for injuries to persons and loss of or damage to property resulting from the negligent operation of such carrier.” (Emphasis supplied.)”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority“. . We think it necessarily follows that plaintiff may also join any other party who is liable for the tort, such as the insurer of the operator of the vehicle involved who has answered the tort liability of one of the other parties.” (p. 91.)”
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.