Matthis v. Kennedy’s Empirical Analysis
1954
Citation profile
3 federal appellate · 21 district · 64 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 96 later decisions — most recently June 2019 · most notably 30 Cal. App. 3d 818 - Bradley v. Hartford Accident & Indemnity Co. (1973), McGranahan v. Dahar (1979)
3 federal appellate · 21 district · 64 state decisions
Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.
Relationships
Relies on 7 E.H. Smith 214 - Youmans v. . Smith · Andrews v. . Gardiner · Laun v. Union Electric Co. of Missouri · Kemper v. Fort · Maulsby v. Reifsnider
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 96 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“Absolute privilege means that immunity is given even for intentionally false statements, coupled with malice, while a qualified or conditional privilege grants immunity only if the privilege is not abused and defamatory statements are publicized in good faith and without malice.”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage“A witness is absolutely privileged to publish defamatory matter concerning another in communications preliminary to a proposed judicial proceeding or as a part of a judicial proceeding in which he is testifying, if it has some relation to the proceeding.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage“In judicial proceedings the privilege is not restricted to trials but includes every proceeding of a judicial nature if the hearing is before a competent court or before a tribunal or officer clothed with judicial or even quasi-judicial powers. The general rule in this country is that, with certain recognized exceptions, defamatory matter published in the due course of a judicial proceeding is absolutely privileged and will not support a civil action for defamation although made maliciously and with knowledge of its falsehood. It extends to the protection of the judge, the jury, the party or parties, counsel and witnesses.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage
How this case has been treated — in progress
Whether each later court followed, distinguished, criticized, or overruled this decision. The treatment classification (task #35) runs highest-cited cases first and lights up here as it reaches this one.