180 Ind. App. 524 - Davidson v. Mathis’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

4 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 4 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “[w]ater from falling rains or melting snows which is diffused over the surface as the natural elevations and depressions of the land may guide it but which has no definite banks or channels. If the natural depressions and elevations of the land form a way for water but such way has no well defined banks or channel and carries no water except that which drains into it from adjoining lands in wet seasons or as the result of freshets, then such way is not a natural water course but a mere surface drain and falls within the doctrine that surface water is a common enemy which any proprietor may combat as best he can.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Birdwell v. Moore

2. “A natural watercourse is established when surface water begins to flow in a definite channel formed with well defined banks and bottom and water flows therein, not necessarily continually but from time immemorial and for a substantial period each year.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Kramer v. Rager