Tanner v. Little’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

16 federal appellate · 24 district · 86 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 205 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““Those were instances (and others might be cited) of the regulation of conduct and the restriction of its freedom, it being the conception of the legislature that the regulation and restriction were in the interest of the public welfare. Those classifications were sustained as legal; being within the power of the legislature over the subject-matter, and having proper bases of community. “But the classification which was sustained in St. Louis Coal Co. v. Illinois, 185 U. S. 203 , 46 L. Ed. 872 , 22 S. Ct. 616 , was condemned in Truax v. Raich, 239 U. S. 33 , 60 L. Ed. 131 , 36 S. Ct. 7 [L. R. A. 1916D, 545, Ann. Cas. 1917B, 283]. The statute in the latter case required employers of more than five workers at any one time to employ not less than 80 per cent, qualified electors or native-born citizens of the United States or of some subdivision of such. The statute was held void because there was no authority to deal with that at which the legislation was aimed. And this is important to be kept in mind. If there is no such authority, a classification, however logical, appropriate, or scientific, will not be sustained; if such authority exist, a classification may be deficient in those attributes, may be harsh and oppressive, and yet be within the power of the legislature. This has been declared many times. Let us apply the test to the case at bar. Let it be granted that the ‘premium system’ is a method of advertising; can there not be differences in advertising which may be subj”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the concurrence
   e.g. State v. Packer Corporation

2. ““The system, therefore, has features different from the ordinary transactions of trade which have their impulse, as we have said, in immediate and definite desires having definite and measurable results. There may be in them at times reckless buying, but it is not provoked or systematized by the seller. “Complainants charge that the tax of the statute is not upon the business, but upon its incidents. The separation is artificial. It is the incidents which give character to the business, affecting it with evil, it was thought, provoking therefore against it the power of the State and taking away from it the immunity it else might have. “It is unimportant what the incidents may be called, whether a method of advertising, discount giving or profit sharing. Their significance is not in their designations but in their influence upon the public welfare. And of this the judgment of the legislature must prevail, though it be controverted and opposed by arguments of strength.” 240 U.S. at page 385, 36 S.Ct. at page 384. The principle has been applied consistently. In a case in which the court sustained a municipal licensing fee applying to commercial warehouses only and not to private warehouses the court stated that “the selection” is not “barred by the fourteenth amendment”. Independent Warehouses, Inc. v. Scheele, 1947, 331 U.S. 70, 86 , 67 S.Ct. 1062, 1071 , 91 L.Ed. 1346 .”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the concurrence
   e.g. Blue & Gold Stamps-U-Save Premium Co. v. Sobieski

3. “"The usual rule for ascertaining value at the time of the taking is not disrespected if one item is made a function of the future because only then can it be known whether that item forms a part of what has been `taken'. * * * The factors on which such a forecast must be based are too contingent, too unique for guidance by experience, to permit rational assessment. This is a situation where the law should express `a judgment from experience as against a judgment from speculation'."”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the concurrence
   e.g. Catlett v. State