Stephens v. Ballou’s Empirical Analysis
1882
Citation profile
2 federal appellate · 23 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 25 later decisions — most recently January 1961 · most notably Copeland v. City of St. Joseph (1895), A. C. Ferrellgas Corp. v. Phoenix Insurance (1961)
2 federal appellate · 23 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 ex rel. Keyser & Elrod v. Hallock
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 25 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““If the provisions of the old act and of the new can be reconciled by any possible mode of interpretation or construction, if the old act and the new can both be given force and effect, according to their terms and under any circumstances, then it should never be held that one overturns and destroys the other, but both should be given full force and effect.””
6 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority““If, however, the plaintiff elects to take the value of the land, and tenders a deed to the defendant, then the land in law and equity becomes the property of the defendant, and all that plaintiff is then entitled to is the value of the land without the improvements. In just what way he may recover that value, the statute, as it now stands, does not prescribe. Under the statute before it was amended in 1873, if the defendant did not pay the value of the land to the plaintiff within a reasonable time — to be fixed by the court —the plaintiff might then have his writ of eviction to obtain possession of the land; but under the law as it now stands, he is not entitled to any such writ. Under the law as it now stands, the plaintiff would probably be entitled to commence an independent action to subject the land, with the improvements, to the payment of his claim, and to sell the land, with the improvements, for that purpose; for undoubtedly his claim is a lien, and a prior lien, upon the land. It is possible, however, that the plaintiff may also have some other remedy.””
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Leighton v. Young · Bruner v. Hunt
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.