Davis v. United States’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

66 federal appellate · 1 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 69 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “* * * The extent to which cross-examination upon collateral matters shall go is a matter peculiarly within the discretion of the trial judge. And his action will not be interfered with unless there has been upon his part a plain abuse of discretion. 3 Wharton's Criminal Evidence (11th Ed.) 1308. See Alford v. United States, 282 U.S. 687 , 694, 51 S.Ct. 218, 75 L.Ed. 624. * * *”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Mays v. United States · Southern Farm Bureau Casualty Insurance v. Mitchell

2. ““Whether prejudice results from the erroneous admission of evidence at a trial is a question that should not be considered abstractly or by way of detachment. The question is one of practical effect, when the trial as a whole and all the circumstances of the proofs are regarded.””

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Blackwell v. United States · Robert James Garner v. United States of America, Lester L. Weddle v. United States

3. ““ * * * [The question is] what effect the error had or reasonably may be taken to have had upon the jury’s decision. The crucial thing is the impact of the thing done wrong on the minds of other men, not on one’s own, in the total setting. [Authorities omitted.] “This must take account of what the error meant to them, not singled out and standing alone, but in relation to all else that happened. * * “If, when all is said and done, the conviction is sure that the error did not influence the jury, or had but very slight effect, the verdict and the judgment should stand, except perhaps where the departure is from a constitutional norm or a specific command of Congress. * * * But if one cannot say, with fair assurance, after pondering all that happened without stripping the erroneous action from the whole, that the judgment was not substantially swayed by the error, it is impossible to conclude that substantial rights were not affected. The inquiry cannot be merely whether there was enough to support the result, apart from the phase affected by the error. It is rather, even so, whether the error itself had substantial influence. If so, or if one is left in grave doubt, the conviction cannot stand.” (Emphasis supplied.)”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Edmonds v. United States