Cragg v. Levinson’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 28 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““The jurisdiction of courts of equity to issue writs to restrain the commission of trespasses is not confined to cases where the injury is irreparable because the defendant is insolvent or because the injury goes to the destruction of the estate or inheritance. We have seen from the cases above cited that a bill to enjoin repeated trespasses, which would require numerous and successive suits in an action at law if the plaintiff were remitted to that remedy, and where the amount recoverable would be disproportionate to the vexation and expense attending the litigation, may be maintained. In such cases it is said the remedy at law is inadequate. In section 496 of Pomeroy’s Equitable Remedies, it is said: The jurisdiction of equity to restrain continuous or repeated trespasses rests on the ground of avoiding a repetition of similar actions. It is a basis of jurisdiction that is frequently found in cases where the injury is also irreparable. Very often, indeed, the injury is irreparable only because it is continuous or repeated when it would not be if temporary, and in such cases the injunction will issue as a matter of course. * * * If the plaintiff’s legal remedy may be vexatious, harassing, and hence inadequate, when he recovers substantial damages, still more would it seem to be so when his recovery is only nominal * *”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. 132 Ill. App. 2d 915 - Harrison v. Rapach