Kuhn v. Fairmont Coal Co.’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

182 federal appellate · 47 district · 65 state decisions

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

1. “[j]udicial decisions have had retrospective operation for near a thousand years.”

   14 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the dissent
   e.g. Rivers v. Roadway Express, Inc. · 171 Conn. App. 61 - R.T. Vanderbilt Co. v. Hartford Accident & Indemnity Co.

2. ““1. When, administering, state laws -and determining rights accruing under those laws, the jurisdiction' of the federal court is an independent one, not subordinate to, but coordinate and concurrent with, the jurisdiction of the state courts. 2. Where, before fhe rights of the parties accrued, certain rules relating to real estate have been so , established by state decisions as to become rules of property and action in the state, those rules are accepted by the federal eourt as authoritative declarations of the law of the state. 3. But where the law of the state has not been thus settled, it is not only the right, but the duty, of the federal eourt to exercise its own judgment, as it also always does when the case before it depends upon the doctrines of commercial law and general jurisprudence. 4. So, when contracts and transactions are entered into- and rights have accrued under a particular state of the local decisions, or when there has been no decision by the state court on the particular question involved, then the federal courts properly claim the right to give effect to their own judgment as to what is the law of the state applicable to the case, even where a different view has been expressed by the state eourt after the rights of parties accrued. But even in such cases, for the sake of comity and to avoid confusion, the federal eourt should always lean to an agreement with the state eourt if the question is balanced with doubt.” See, also, Swift v. Tyson, 16 Pet. 1 ,”

   12 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Fretts v. Shriver · Steele v. Highland Park Mfg. Co.

3. “[E]ven the independent jurisdiction of the circuit courts of the United States is a jurisdiction only to declare the law, at least, in a case like the present, and only to declare the law of the state. It is not an authority to make it.”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the dissent
   e.g. In Re: Orso · In the Matter Of: Paul William Orso Valerie Canfield v. Paul William Orso and Martin a Schott