Williams v. Johnson’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

2 district · 26 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 28 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““The rule has been recently restated by Judge (now Chief Judge) Hammond in the opinion of the Court in Stankovich v. Lehman, 230 Md. 426, 432 , 187 A. 2d 309, 313 (1963) : ‘To be successful in moving to strike a judgment by confession, one must adduce evidence in support of his motion sufficient to persuade the fair and reasoned judgment of an ordinary man that there are substantial and sufficient grounds for an actual controversy as to the merits of the case. If he does so, he is deemed to have met the burden of showing he has a meritorious defense, without the necessity of showing he will eventually prevail. This is to say that if the evidence is such that persons of ordinary judgment and prudence could fairly draw different inferences from it, the controversy should not be decided as a matter of law but instead should be submitted to a trier of fact. If a meritorious defense is made out (by affidavits or testimony, Johnson v. Phillips, supra, 143 Md. 16 , 122 A. 7 ), the Court should liberally exercise its equitable jurisdiction over judgments entered by confession and, on application of a defendant who prima facie shows such defense, vacate the judgment to permit a trial on the merits. Cropper v. Graves, 216 Md. 229 , 139 A. 2d 721 ; Remsburg v. Baker, 212 Md. 465, 470 , 129 A. 2d 687 ; Keiner v. Commerce Trust Co., 154 Md. 366, 370-371 , 141 A. 121 . ””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Shreffler v. Haight