Beach v. Commonwealth’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

4 federal appellate · 14 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 18 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “The statute does not in terms require notice to defendant; but in so important and vital a matter as the constitution of the jury or the place of trial, can it be assumed that the Legislature intended that the proceedings authorized should take place without notice to or in the absence of one accused of a felony? If it had been a motion by the prisoner for a change of venue, the State would have been entitled to a hearing and to oppose and even defeat the prisoner's motion unless good cause was shown therefor. In effect the summoning of a jury from another county amounts to a change of venue, and to give the statute a construction that would deprive one accused of crime of the right to be heard thereon, would at once condemn the law as invalid.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. State v. Bail

2. “The fact that the jury returned a verdict in about eight minutes after having the case submitted to them does not indicate to us that Beach did not receive a fair trial when the issues of fact were so clearly drawn. It is true that a verdict should be the result of dispassionate consideration and the jury, if necessary, should deliberate patiently until they reach a proper conclusion concerning the issues submitted to them. Yet where the law does not positively prescribe the length of time a jury shall spend in deliberation, the courts will not apply an arbitrary rule based upon the limits of time.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 93 Ark. App. 202 - D.B.&J. Holden Farms Ltd. Partnership v. Arkansas State Highway Commission