McClure v. Maitland’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

5 federal appellate · 1 district · 36 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 49 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““ 4. All lands in this State, waste and unappropriated, or heretofore or hereafter for any cause forfeited, or treated as forfeited, or escheated to the State of Virginia or this State, or purchased by either and become irredeemable, not redeemed, released, transferred or otherwise disposed of, the title whereto shall remain in this State till such sale as is hereinafter mentioned be made, shall by proceedings in the Circuit Court of the county in which the lands or a part thereof, are situated, be sold to the highest bidder. “ 5. The former owner of any such land shall be entitled to receive the excess of the sum for which the land may be sold over the taxes charged and chargeable thereon, or which, if the land had not been forfeited, would have been charged or chargeable, thereon,-since the'formation of this-State, with interest at the rate of twelve per centum per annum, and the costs of the proceedings, if his claim be filed in the Circuit Court that decrees the sale, within two years thereafter.. • “ 6. It shall be the duty of every owner of land to have it entered on the land books of the county in which it, or a part of it, is situated, and to cause, himself to be charged with the taxes thereon, and pay the same.- When for any five successive years after the year 1869 the owner of any tract of land containing one thousand acres or more shall not have been charged on such books with state tax on said land, then by operation hereof the land shall be forfeited and the tit”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. Rich v. Braxton · King v. Mullins

2. ““The title to the land and all the right and interest of the former owner having thus by his default and the operation of the law become absolutely vested in the state and become irredeemable, she, having thus acquired a perfect title to and unqualified dominion over the land, had the undoubted right to hold or dispose of it for any proper purpose, in any manner, and upon any terms and conditions she might in her sovereign capacity deem proper, without consulting the 'former owner or any one else; for after the forfeiture had become complete, as it had in the case before us, the former owner had no more claim to or lien upon the land than one who never had pretended to own it. In the exercise of this perfect dominion over her own property' the state saw proper to transfer and vest her title to so much of said land owned by her in any person, other than those who occasioned the default, as such person may have been in the actual possession of, or have just title to, claiming the same and was not in default for the taxes thereon chargeáble to him. 4 4 * And all the right, title, and interest of the former owner having been completely divested, he has not a particle of interest in the land, no more than if he had never owned it. * * * The whole history as well as the express language of this constitutional provision proves that it was the intention to bestow upon the former owner -whatever part of the proceeds of sale might be actually paid or liable to be paid into the state tr”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Fay v. Crozer

3. ““In Wild v. Serpell, supra, Judge Lee, in delivering the opinion of the court, says: ‘Considering the peculiar condition of things in. that portion of the state lying west of the Alleghany Mountains, and the serious check to population and the improvement of the country and the development of its resources growing out of it, a resort to the stringent measures of legislation that were adopted was, in my opinion, as wise and expedient as the constitutional power of the Legislature to enact them was clear and unquestionable.’ Wild’s Lessee v. Serpell, 10 Grat. (Va.) 400.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Fay v. Crozer