Happy v. Blanton’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

2 federal appellate · 43 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 46 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““The Court instructs * * * that it was the duty of Vito Rallo, the driver of the automobile in which plaintiff was riding, to exercise the highest degree of care in the operation of his said automobile while traveling north on Toelle Avenue, in that if the said driver * * * intended to stop his automobile on said highway, it was the duty of said Vito Rallo to give an adequate warning or signal of his intention to stop * * *. “The Court further instructs * * * that if you find and believe from the evidence that while the said Vito Rallo was operating his said automobile northwardly on Toelle Avenue, the defendant Gabriel Lancia was also operating his automobile northwardly on said Toelle Avenue, and behind the automobile of the said Vito Rallo; and if you further find that the said Vito Rallo did stop his automobile while it was in front of and ahead of the automobile of the defendant Gabriel Lancia; and if you further find from the evidence that in so stopping his said automobile the said Vito Rallo did not give an adequate warning or signal of his intention to stop his said automobile; and if you further find that such failure on the part of the said Vito Rallo, if any, was the sole cause of the collision and injuries, if any, to plaintiff, without any negligence whatsoever on the part of the said Gabriel Lancia, then the Court instructs you that the plaintiff is not entitled to recover, and your verdict must be for the defendant * *”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Rallo ex rel. Rallo v. Lancia

2. ““Therefore, if the defendant undertakes to absolve himself from liabilty to plaintiff on the basis of sole cnuse negligence, he thereby assumes the burden of hypothesizing a statement of facts, supported by the evidence, from which a jury could find that not only did his negligence not contribute in causing plaintiff’s injuries, but in addition thereto that the sole proximate cause of plaintiff’s injuries was the negligence of someone other than him, and the hypothesization of facts in the instruction, or by proper reference to other instructions, must be complete in both respects.” (Emphasis ours.)”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Maul v. Filimon

3. ““A defendant may undertake to absolve himself of liability on the ground that he was not negligent in the respects charged in plaintiff’s instructions, and he may submit this issue to the jury by what it referred to as a converse instruction, which by its nature does not call for the hypothesization of facts to show that the injuries of the plaintiff resulted from the negligence of someone else.” ( 303 S. W.2d 1 . c. 637.)”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Harris v. Goggins