Wood’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

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 2 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “allows the Director discretion to place in retired status any participant in the retirement program who has completed 20 years of total federal service (at least 10 of which were with the CIA, and five of which were qualifying service) and is at least 50 years of age. If a participant is separated before the concurrence of these two events — age and service — his separation is covered by Section 234; the participant with at least 5 years of service (no maximum is set) can either draw out his contributions or elect to receive a deferred annuity at age 62. While plaintiff, at his separation, did have the requisite years and types of service, he was not 50; there is nothing in the retirement statute which, when plaintiff does reach 50, will allow him retroactively to meet the conditions for eligibility which had to exist at the time of his separation for an annuity at age 50 to accrue. Under the statute, plaintiff is not entitled to an annuity until he reaches 62. Plaintiff has also contended that his decision to join the retirement program created a contract between him and the agency to provide retirement benefits when plaintiff attained both the specified service and age 50. He says that when the Director removed him, making it impossible for him to meet the age requirement, the contract was breached. This argument must obviously be rejected. There was no contract that plaintiff had to be allowed to serve until 50. It must be remembered, too, that, at least until the conditio”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Wood v. United States

2. “[a]t best, plaintiff is claiming that he is not going to get at age 50 what is due him; such a claim is for future relief which we may not now entertain. * * *”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Wood v. United States