Thomas v. United States’s Empirical Analysis
192 U.S. 363 · 1904
Citation profile
35 federal appellate · 14 district · 18 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 115 later decisions (25 by the Supreme Court) — most recently February 2010 · most notably Flint v. Stone Tracy Co. (1911), Chas Steward Mach Co v. Davis (1937)
35 federal appellate · 14 district · 18 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 M'Culloch v. State of Maryland · Munn v. Illinois · Trustees of Dartmouth College v. Woodward · Barbier v. Connolly · Knowlton v. Moore
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 115 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“[t]he sale of stocks is a particular business transaction”
4 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority““The present case involves a stamp tax on a memorandum or contract of sale of a certificate of stock, which plaintiff in error claims was unlawfully exacted because not falling within the class of duties, imposts, and excises, and being, on the contrary, a direct tax on property. “There is no occasion to attempt to confine the words duties, imposts, and excises to the limits of precise definition. We think that they were, used comprehensively to cover customs and excise duties imposed on importation, consumption, manufacture, and sale of certain commodities, privileges, particular business transactions, vocations, occupations, and the like.”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority““Before proceeding to consider the nature and extent of the power conferred by this clause, and the reasons on which it is founded, it seems necessary to settle the grammatical construction of the clause, and to ascertain its true reading. Do the words, ‘to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises’, constitute a distinct substantial power; and the words, ‘to pay the debts and provide for the common defence and general welfare of the United States,’ constitute another distinct and substantial power ? Or are, the latter words connect ed with the former so as to constitute a qualification upon them? This has been a topic of political controversy, and has furnished abundant material for popular declamation and alarm. If the former be the true interpretation, then it is obvious that under color of the generality of the words “and provide for the common defense and general welfare,’ the government of the United States is, in reality, a government of general and unlimited powers, notwithstanding the subsequent enumeration of specific powers. If the latter be the true construction, then the power of taxation only is given by the clause, and it is limited to objects of a national character, ‘to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and the general welfare.’ § 908. The former opinion has been maintained by some minds of great ingenuity and liberality of views. The latter has been the generally received sense of the nation, and seems supported by reasoning at once ”
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.