Hornsby v. Smith’s Empirical Analysis
1941
Citation profile
30 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 30 later decisions — most recently November 1992 · most notably 108 Wis. 2d 223 - Prah v. Maretti (1982), National Association for Advancement of Colored People v. Overstreet (1965)
30 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 American Bank & Trust Co. v. Federal Reserve Bank · Thompson v. Androscoggin River Improvement Co. · Burke v. Smith · Flaherty v. Moran · Barger v. . Barringer
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 30 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““But it must be remembered that no man has a legal right to make a malicious use of his property, not for any benefit or advantage to himself, but for the avowed purpose of damaging his neighbor. To hold otherwise would make the law a convenient engine, in cases like the present, to injure and destroy the peace and comfort, and to damage the property, of one’s neighbor for no other than a wicked purpose, which in itself is, or ought to be, unlawful. The right to do this cannot, in an enlightened country, exist, either in the use of property, or in any way or manner. There is no doubt in my mind that these uncouth screens or ‘obscurers’ as they are named in the record, are a nuisance, and were erected without right, and for a malicious purpose. What right has the defendant, in the light of the just and beneficent principles of equity, to shut out God’s free air and sunlight from the windows of his neighbor, not for any benefit or advantage to himself, or profit to his land, but simply to gratify his own wicked malice against his neighbor? None whatever. The wanton infliction of damage can never be a right. It is a wrong, and a violation of right, and is not without remedy. The right to breath the air, and to enjoy the sunshine, is a natural one; and no man can pollute the atmosphere, or shut out the light of heaven, for no better reason than that the situation of his property is such that he is given the opportunity of so doing, and wishes to gratify his spite and malice towar”
1 later decision quote this exact passage“By an act of the General Assembly approved February 25, 1784 (Cobb's Dig. 721), the common law of England was made the law of this State. . . Section 1 of that act made all laws that were of force in the State on May 14, 1776, including the common law, so far as they were not contrary to the constitution, laws, and form of government now established in this State, of full force and effect upon the passage of that act.”
1 later decision quote this exact passagee.g. Peacock v. Peacock
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.