299 Pa. Super. 474 - Harvey v. Hansen’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

48 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. ““The ‘natural condition’ standard for imposing or not imposing liability creates the anomalous situation of imposing liability on a landowner who improves and maintains his property while precluding liability of a neighboring landowner who allows the ‘natural condition’ of his property to run wild. Under this analysis, landowner A may plant hedges or bushes around the perimeter of his property and if they are allowed to become too thick or too tall so as to obstruct a motorist’s vision of an intersection, he will be held liable. Landowner B, on the other hand, may neglect his property, allowing it to be overrun and overgrown with weeds, plants, grasses and other natural foilage, to an equal or greater detriment to passing motorists, but with no liability to himself. The distinction appears to be arbitrary at best.””

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. Melnick v. C.S.X. Corp. · McGarr 83-1710 v. United States 83-1729

2. “The fact that an intervening act of a third person [here John] is negligent in itself or is done in a negligent manner does not make it a superseding cause of harm to another which the actor’s [here Michael’s] negligent conduct is a substantial factor in bringing about, if (a) the actor at the time of his negligent conduct should have realized that a third person might so act, or (b) a reasonable man knowing the situation existing when the act of the third person was done would not regard it as highly extraordinary that the third person so acted, or (c) the intervening act is a normal consequence of a situation created by the actor’s conduct and the manner in which it is done is not extraordinarily negligent.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 454 Pa. Super. 242 - Frey v. Smith

3. “analysis for determining a landowner's liability for obstructing the vision of passing motorists, was a 1963 Chester County case which was never appealed, which has never been followed, and which we now specifically reject. 25 299 Pa.Super. at 487, 445 A.2d at 1234. 26 Thus, as recently as 1982 the Pennsylvania Superior Court soundly rejected the”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. McGarr 83-1710 v. United States 83-1729