Gardner v. Kellogg’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

26 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 26 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““Whatever may be the reason for the rule as applied to criminal cases — whether it is that statements of this character as to the cause and immediate consequences of the injury, made by the injured party so soon after the injury, and while still under the influence of the smart and suffering occasioned by it, constitute a part of the res gestee, as was held in Thompson v. Trevannion, Skinner, 402, approved in Aveson v. Lord Kinnaird, 6 East, 188, and in Insurance Co. v. Mosley, 8 Wall. (U. S.) 397; or whether it is that silence under such circumstances is so contrary to. human experience, and to the natural and ordinary conduct of a woman suffering under such a wrong, as to raise, if not explained, an unfavorable presumption affecting the credibility of her testimony as a witness, and hence, as is suggested by Woodruff, J., in Baccio v. People, 41 N. Y. 265, 268 , affirmative proof is admissible to repel the inference — it would seem quite clear that the rule has for its support a foundation equally as firm and reasonable in civil as in criminal actions. If it is a sound and safe rule to observe in the determination of a controverted fact which is to affect the liberty and dearest personal rights of the citizen, it is difficult to perceive why it ought not to be followed in the ascertainment of the same fact when his pecuniary interests alone are involved.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Totten v. Totten