George Fuller Co v. Otis Elevator Co’s Empirical Analysis
245 U.S. 489 · 1918
Citation profile
64 federal appellate · 15 district · 34 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 122 later decisions — most recently April 1992 · most notably McFall v. Compagnie Maritime Belge (Lloyd Royal) S. A. (1952), Crawford v. Pope & Talbot, Inc. (1953)
64 federal appellate · 15 district · 34 state decisions — followed in 11 states
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.
Appellate journey
reviewedthe decision below (from District of Columbia Circuit Court of Appeals)
Relationships
Relies on Mashington Gaslight Co v. District of Columbia · City and County of Denver v. New York Trust Company No 642 City and County of Denver · Bruce v. Tobin · George Fuller Company v. Wilson a McCloskey
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 122 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““ ‘In view of the adjudicated facts which were not open to the consideration of a second jury there was no such primary liability on the part of the Otis Company as will support an action for indemnity.’ ” This Court continued and said: “But there were no facts, whether adjudicated in the former case or not, that were not open to the consideration of the jury in this. The Otis Company was joined as a party defendant, it is true, in the former action, and a verdict was directed in its favor. But even if the former verdict against the petitioner had gone on the same issue that was tried in the present case, which was not the fact, it could not have concluded the petitioner in favor of the Otis Company for the reason, if no other, that the Otis Company was dismissed from the suit before the petitioner’s evidence was heard, “The former judgment did not decide that the evidence in the present case showed as matter of law that Locke, who was in the general service of the Otis Company, was transferred for the moment to the petitioner. It did decide as matter of law that as between the Maekay Company and the petitioner their agreement left the petitioner responsible. It had no occasion to decide and did not purport to decide more. Even if it had gone farther it would have been res inter alios as an adjudication and it would not have been a precedent because the evidence in the present case had additional details which, if mea-gre, still made it impossible to say as matter of law that”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
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.