Phelps v. The Cecelia Ann’s Empirical Analysis
199 F.2d 627 · 1952
Citation profile
4 federal appellate · 5 district ·
How this case has been cited
Cited by 16 later decisions — most recently March 1996
4 federal appellate · 5 district ·
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 The Key City · Southern Coal & Coke Co. v. F. Grauds Kugniecibas · Nolte v. Hudson Nav. Co. · Magee v. The Lyndhurst
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 16 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““In the case at bar, not only had libellants not acted within the six months limited by the state statute for perfecting and enforcing a lien for labor and materials, but they had delayed action for more than two years and until after the rights of a bona fide purchaser without notice had intervened. Under such circumstances it is perfectly clear that libellants are barred by their laches from enforcing the lien. As said by Mr. Justice Miller in The Key City, 14 Wall. 653 , 20 L.Ed. 896 , the following propositions are well established with respect to the lapse of time as a defense to suits for enforcement of maritime liens, viz.: “ ‘1. That while the courts of admiralty are not governed in such cases by any statute of limitation, they adopt the principle that laches or delay in the judicial enforcement of maritime liens will, under proper circumstances, constitute a valid defence. “ ‘2. That no arbitrary or fixed period of time has been, or will be, established as an inflexible rule, but that the delay which will defeat such a suit must in every case depend on the peculiar equitable circumstances of that case. “ ‘3. That where the lien is to be enforced to the detriment of a purchaser for value, without notice of the lien, the defence will be held valid under shorter time, and a more rigid scrutiny of the circumstances of the delay, than when the claimant is the owner at the time the lien accrued.’ ””
1 later decision quote this exact passage““... wherever a secret lien is sought to be established upon a vessel which has passed into the possession of a bona fide owner who was ignorant of its existence, and who had no reasonable opportunity to discover it, the court will make rigid scrutiny of the circumstances of the delay, and if there has been reasonable time to enforce the lien, and the vessel has been within reach of process, the party neglecting to avail himself of it will not be allowed to enforce it to the prejudice of an innocent third party.””
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.