194 Cal. App. 2d 257 - Nault v. Smith’s Empirical Analysis
1961
Citation profile
42 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 42 later decisions — most recently August 2005 · most notably 141 Cal. App. 3d 524 - Safeco Insurance v. Gilstrap (1983), 55 Ill. App. 3d 959 - Rosenberg v. Packerland Packing Co. (1977)
42 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 37 Cal. 2d 356 - Malloy v. Fong · 9 Cal. 2d 279 - McCann v. Hoffman · Creek Nation v. McGhee · Martinez v. Southern Pacific Co. · Prager v. Isreal
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 42 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““A hypothetical case may aid in the clarification of the issue of Mrs. Smith’s independent liability. Suppose that Mrs. Smith knew that Debbie’s vision were defective and that she required the use of glasses for driving. If Mrs. Smith sent Debbie on the errand, knowing that she did not have the glasses, and an accident occurred not because of her negligence but because of Debbie’s poor vision, Mrs. Smith could well be found liable for her independent negligence. Mrs. Smith’s liability would not rest upon any negligence of the driver, or vicarious liability, but upon her own carelessness in dispatching Debbie without her glasses. The guest statute would not apply. . . . “Respondents . . . contend that in cases, such as Benton , ‘involving defective automobiles . . . the owner may be liable even though the driver himself was free of negligence. ’ We see no valid distinction, however, between the dispatch of the car with defective brakes and its dispatch with a defective driver. “Can it be argued, however, that Benton may be distinguished, and the statute become applicable because Debbie sat at the wheel and it was her conduct which caused the accident; that Mrs. Smith obtains the protection of the section because she cannot be held ‘legally liable for the conduct of the driver’! [Italics by court.] The point is, however, that Mrs. Smith is not charged with the conduct of the driver; she incurs liability because she dispatched the jeep with an incompetent driver. Mrs. Smith’s to”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage“We conclude that there is nothing inherent in the California guest statute which insulates an owner of a vehicle for his own independent negligence in entrusting it to an incompetent driver. Benton v. Sloss, supra, 38 Cal.2d 399 , [ 240 P.2d 575 ], makes it clear that the owner as such holds no talisman against liability; the guest statute does not inexorably reach backwards to exonerate the owner from his own tort.”
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.