Brault v. Smith’s Empirical Analysis
1984
Citation profile
5 federal appellate · 86 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 93 later decisions — most recently March 2026 · most notably Seltzer v. Morton (2007), First Bank v. District Court for the Fourth Judicial District (1987)
5 federal appellate · 86 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 7 Cal. 3d 94 - Barquis v. Merchants Collection Assn. · Gagnon Co., Inc. v. Nevada Desert Inn · Fox v. 7L Bar Ranch Co. · Farmers Gin Company v. Ward · 28 Wash. App. 737 - Batten v. Abrams
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 93 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“[t]he basic proposition behind the doctrine of res judicata has always remained the same: a party should not be able to relitigate a matter he or she has already had an opportunity to litigate.”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority““(1) the parties or the privies must be the same; (2) the subject matter of the action must be the same; (3) the issues must be the same and relate to the same subject matter; and (4) the capacities of the persons must be the same in relation to the subject matter and issues between them. [Emphasis added.]””
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“[p]ressing valid legal claims to their regular conclusion, even with an ulterior motive, does not by itself constitute abuse of process.”
2 later decisions 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.