Miller v. Union Pacific R.’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

127 federal appellate · 12 district · 86 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 260 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““The validity of this contention depends altogether upon whether the negligence of the husband constituted an intervening cause which had the effect of turning aside the course of events set in motion by the company, and in and of itself producing the actionable result. The evidence here does not present that situation. Instead of a remote cause and a separate intervening, self-sufficient, proximate cause, we have here concurrent acts, co-operating to produce the result. As this court pointed out in Washington & G. R. Co. v. Hickey, 166 U. S. 521, 525 , 17 S. Ct. 661 , 41 L. Ed. 1101 [1102], the vice of the argument consists in the attempt to separate into two distinct causes (remote and proximate) what in reality is but one continuous cause: that is to say, an attempt to separate two inseparable negligent acts which, uniting to produce the result, constituted mutually contributing acts of negligence on the part of the railroad company and the driver of the automobile. “The negligence sought to be established against the railroad company was not only failure to sound the whistle, but operation of the train at a rate of speed dangerous and unusual, and which necessarily would bring the train into the city at a speed far beyond the limit prescribed by the city ordinance. Assuming, upon these facts, that a finding by the jury that the train was negligently operated would be justified, such negligence continued without interruption down to the moment of ■the accident. The same is”

   3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. 111 Ind. App. 550 - McIntosh v. Pennsylvania Railroad · Dedina Ex Rel. Dedina v. Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul & Pacific Railroad

2. “`It is no defense for a wrongdoer that a third party shared the guilt of the same wrongful act, nor can he escape liability for the damages he has caused on the ground that the wrongful act of a third party contributed to the injury.'”

   3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Hicks v. United States · Duvall Transfer & Delivery Service v. Beaman ex rel. Beaman

3. ““Contributory negligence on his part was clearly established under the general rule frequently stated by this court. We need ido no more than refer to the case of Northern Pacific Railroad’ v. Freeman, 174 U. S. 379 , where a person killed by a moving-train at a railroad crossing well known to him, with the coming train in full view which he could have seen while 40 feet distant from the track if he had looked, was held guilty of contributory negligence because, putting aside the oral testimony, these facts demonstrated that either he did not look or took the chance of crossing before the train reached him. ‘When it appears,’ the court said (pp. 383-384), ‘that if proper precautions were taken they could not have failed to prove effectual, the court has no right to assume, especially in face of all the oral testimony, that such precautions were taken. * * * Judging from the common experience of men, there can be but one plausible solution of the problem how the collision occurred. He did not look; or if he looked, he did not heed the warning, and took the chance of crossing the track before the train could reach him. In either case he was clearly guilty of contributory negligence.’ Authority for this view was found especially in Railroad Co. v. Houston, 95 U. S. 697, 702 .””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Sand Springs Railway Co. v. McWilliams