Holmes v. Hurst’s Empirical Analysis
174 U.S. 82 · 1899
Citation profile
87 federal appellate · 17 district · 16 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 228 later decisions (9 by the Supreme Court) — most recently September 2015 · most notably Dr. Miles Medical Co. v. John D. Park & Sons Co. (1911), International News Service v. Associated Press (1918)
87 federal appellate · 17 district · 16 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.
Appellate journey
reviewedthe decision below (from Second Circuit Court of Appeals)
Relationships
Relies on Reckendorfer v. Faber · Hailes v. Van Wormer · Pickering v. McCullough · Henry Wheaton v. Richard Peters · Richards v. Chase Elevator Co.
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 228 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““The right thus secured by the copyright act is not a right to the use of certain words, because they are the common property of the human race, and are as little susceptible of private appropriation as air or sunlight; nor is it the right to ideas alone, since in the absence of means of communicating them they are of value to no one but the author. But the right is to that arrangement of words which the author has selected to express his ideas.” 174 U.S. at page 86 , 19 S.Ct. at page 607 .”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority““The substance of these enactments is that by section 1 the author is only entitled to a copyright of hooks not printed and published; and by section i, that, as a preliminary to the recording of a copyright, he must, before publication, deposit a printed copy of the title of such book.””
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Mifflin v. Dutton
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.