Bell v. Brown’s Empirical Analysis
1863
Citation profile
17 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 18 later decisions — most recently February 1935
17 state decisions — followed in 10 states
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 Kidd v. Laird · Gardner v. . Clark · Buhler v. Wentworth · Hollenbeck v. Clow · Dovan v. Dinsmore
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 18 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““It is an absolute right given him by law, and the principle is as old as the common law itself. He may fail to prove one defense by reason of the loss of papers, absence, death, or want of recollection of a witness, and yet he. ought not thereby to be precluded from proving another equally sufficient to defeat the action.””
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.