Meissel v. Finley’s Empirical Analysis
1956
Citation profile
15 federal appellate · 39 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 75 later decisions — most recently August 2018 · most notably Richardson v. Paxton Company (1962), Foti v. Cook (1980)
15 federal appellate · 39 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 Worrie v. Christine · Arthur Murray Dance Studios of Cleveland, Inc. v. Witter · Lanier v. Bowdoin · Sonotone Corp. v. . Baldwin · Granger v. Craven
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 75 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“(1) Is the restraint, from the standpoint of the employer, reasonable in the sense that it is no greater than is necessary to protect the employer in some legitimate business interest? 41 (2) From the standpoint of the employee, is the restraint reasonable in the sense that it is not unduly harsh and oppressive in curtailing his legitimate efforts to earn a livelihood? 42 (3) Is the restraint reasonable from the standpoint of a sound public policy?”
6 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“[t]he possession of trade secrets and confidential information is an important consideration in testing the reasonableness of a restriction on competition.”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“That restrictive covenants of this character which reasonably protect the employer’s business and are incident and ancillary to the contract of employment and limited as to area and duration are enforceable in equity is not open to question .... Such covenants will be enforced unless found to be contrary to public policy, unnecessary for the employer’s protection or unnecessarily restrictive of the rights of the employees, due regard being had to the subject matter of the contract and the circumstances and conditions under which it is to be performed.”
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.