Knox v. United States Lines Co.’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

40 federal appellate · 2 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 51 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “for a partial new trial limited to the issue of possible unseaworthiness caused by the manner of breaking down the stowage * * *.”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Scott v. Isbrandtsen Co. · Ferrante v. Swedish American Lines

2. “* * * On its face, this language covered and restricted liability for unseaworthiness resulting from `a temporary or transitory unsafe condition.' We understand that, with respect to the condition created by the longshoremen, the case had been so presented as to focus the attention of the trial judge primarily upon the question of negligence in making the hold an unsafe place to work. Moreover, to the extent that he may also have considered unseaworthiness, our Cookingham [Cookingham v. United States, 184 F.2d 213 , 3d Cir. 1950, cert. den. 340 U.S. 935, 71 S.Ct. 495, 95 L.Ed. 675 (1951)] decision seemed to justify the charge as given. However, Cookingham was in effect overruled, and just such a charge as this one was held to be reversible error, by the Supreme Court in Mitchell v. Trawler Racer Inc., supra [ 362 U.S. 539 , 80 S.Ct. 926, 4 L.Ed.2d 941]. Since the ship in the Mitchell case was held responsible for the slippery condition of a rail created in unloading cargo even though that condition had not existed long enough to afford the ship a reasonable opportunity to discover and correct it, the court below erred in charging that `the ship owner would not be held responsible for a temporary and transitory unsafe condition of which the ship's officers would have no adequate warning.'”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Scott v. Isbrandtsen Co.

3. “* * * The longshoremen began their work by unloading the burlap rolls in the center of the hold under the hatch opening to a depth, as estimated by the longshoremen themselves, of from six to eight feet, or three or four layers. The opening thus created was wider at the top than at the bottom because the marginal roll in each layer rested on and between two rolls of the next layer. Thus, each layer extended somewhat farther — about the radius of a roll — into the cleared area than did the next overlying layer. Looking upward from the floor of the cleared area the face of the stowage sloped away from the center of the hatch, like the face of a pyramid. In different metaphor, the clearing was somewhat `V' shaped.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. William Knox, in No. 13973 v. United States Lines Company, in No. 13974 v. T. Hogan Corporation