Stearns v. Minnesota’s Empirical Analysis
179 U.S. 223 · 1900
Citation profile
17 federal appellate · 7 district · 54 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 161 later decisions (38 by the Supreme Court) — most recently August 2012 · most notably Williams v. Mayor and City Council of Baltimore Same (1933), Oklahoma v. United States Civil Service Commission (1947)
17 federal appellate · 7 district · 54 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.
Relationships
Relies on Fort Leavenworth Co v. Lowe · Van Brocklin v. Anderson · McCullough v. Commonwealth of Virginia · Green v. Biddle · Wisconsin Cent Co v. Price County
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 161 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““My understanding does not permit me to doubt that to preserve in this case the contract in its entirety, so far as the rights of the state are concerned, and at the same time to destroy the reciprocal duty owed by the state to the other contracting party, is not to repeal, alter or amend the contract at all, but, whilst preserving it, to endeavor by an act of arbitrary power to impose a. burden incompatible with the very provisions and terms of the amendatory act itself * * * the agreements being thus interdependent are of necessity indivisible, and to retain the entire duty or right of one party to the contract must lead to the preservation of the corresponding and reciprocal right or duty of the other.””
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority““Considering for a moment the ratified agreement which the gross receipt tax law embodied, it is patent that the duties which it imposed and the obligations to which it gave rise were in the strictest sense reciprocal or commutative ; that is, that the agreement to pay the gross receipt tax, * * * was predicated on the obligation on the part of the state to regard the pay ment of said tax as the discharge by the corporation of all taxes due upon all its real or personal property.””
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority““As a preliminary matter, it is worthy of note that the alleged invalidity of this contract, in respect to taxation, was not complained of for 30 years. Whether the revenues of the state were benefited or injured by this method of taxation we are not advised, hut it does appear that neither party challenged it. Both the railroads and- the state accepted and acted under it for nearly a third of a century.””
1 later decision quote this exact passage
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.