State v. Pugh’s Empirical Analysis
1959
Citation profile
3 federal appellate · 7 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 12 later decisions — most recently March 1971
3 federal appellate · 7 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 State v. Dockery · State v. . Little · State v. Bowen · State v. McCoy · State v. Conner
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 12 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“The language of this amendment stands in bold relief. It is plain and free from ambiguity and expresses a single, definite and sensible meaning, — a meaning which under the settled law of this State is conclusively presumed to be the one intended by the Legislature. * * * 11 "It is patent that the sole purpose of the act is to give to the jury in all cases where a verdict of guilty of murder in the first degree shall have been reached, the right to recommend that the punishment for the crime shall be imprisonment for life in the State's prison. * * * No conditions are attached to, and no qualifications or limitations are imposed upon, the right of the jury to so recommend. It is an unbridled discretionary right. And it is incumbent upon the court to so instruct the jury. In this, the defendant has a substantive right. Therefore, any instruction, charge or suggestion as to the causes for which the jury could or ought to recommend is error sufficiently to set aside a verdict where no recommendation is made.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the concurrencee.g. Crawford v. Bounds“A murder * * * which shall be committed in perpetration or attempt to perpetrate any arson, rape, robbery, burglary or other felony, shall be deemed to be murder in the first degree and shall be punished with death: Provided, if at the time of rendering its verdict in open court, the jury shall so recommend, the punishment shall be imprisonment for life in the State's prison, and the court shall so instruct the jury.”
1 later decision quote this exact passagee.g. State v. Williams
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.