McPherson v. Leonard’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

15 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 15 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “to be in the enactment of a law, as otherwise than directory to the Legislature to secure, as we have before said, uniformity in the laws. They certainly are not of the essence of the law. They furnish no aid in its construction, and its provisions are as clear and intelligible without them, as they would be with them.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Prince George's Co. v. B. O.R. Co.

2. “Being satisfied that the words `by the General Assembly of Maryland' are not of the essence and substance of a law, but their use directory only to the Legislature, we cannot, because of their omission from the enactment, declare the law in question unconstitutional and void.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Prince George's Co. v. B. O.R. Co.

3. “We have very carefully considered and anxiously weighed and examined the question now before us, and cannot regard the provision requiring the words, "by the General Assembly of Maryland,”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Prince George's Co. v. B. O.R. Co.