Mitchell v. United States’s Empirical Analysis
267 U.S. 341 · 1925
Citation profile
103 federal appellate · 33 district · 86 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 507 later decisions (55 by the Supreme Court) — most recently August 2024 · most notably Olson v. United States (1934), United States v. General Motors Corp. (1945)
103 federal appellate · 33 district · 86 state decisions — followed in 24 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.
Relationships
Relies on Boom Company v. Patterson · Sharp v. United States · United States v. North American Transportation & Trading Co. · Joslin Mfg Co v. City of Providence
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 507 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“* * * The settled rules of law, however, precluded his considering in that determination consequential damages for losses to their business, or for its destruction. Joslin Manufacturing Co. v. Providence, 262 U.S. 668 , 675 [ 43 S.Ct. 684 , 67 L.Ed. 1167 ]. Compare Sharp v. United States, 191 U.S. 341 [ 24 S.Ct. 114 , 48 L.Ed. 211 ]; Campbell v. United States, 266 U.S. 368 [ 45 S.Ct. 115 , 69 L.Ed. 328 ], No recovery therefor can be had now as for a taking of the business. There is no finding as a fact that the Government took the business, or that what it did was intended as a taking. If the business was destroyed, the destruction was an unintended incident of the taking of land. There can be no recovery under the Tucker Act if the intention to take is lacking, Tempel v. United States, 248 U.S. 121 [ 39 S.Ct. 56 , 63 L.Ed. 162 ]. Moreover, the Act did not confer authority to take a business. In the absence of authority, even an intentional taking cannot support an action for compensation under the Tucker Act. United States v. North American Co., 253 U.S. 330 [ 40 S.Ct. 518 , 64 L.Ed. 935 ].”
12 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority““[I]t does not follow that, in the absence of an agreement, the plaintiffs can compel payment for such losses. To recover, they must show some statutory right conferred. States have not infrequently directed the payment of compensation in similar situations. The constitutions of some require that compensation be made for consequential damages to private property resulting from public improvements. [Citations omitted.] Others have, in authorizing specific public improvements, conferred the right to such compensation. [Citations omitted.] Congress had, of course, the power to make like provision here.” 267 U.S. at 345-46 .”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“[t]he settled policy of Congress, in authorizing the taking of land and appurtenances, has been to limit the right to compensation to interests in the land taken.”
1 later decision 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.