Walker's Appeal’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

54 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 55 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “To sustain appellee’s contention that a teacher whose department has been discontinued must be retained, and the board compelled to pay her while she is idle, would seriously handicap our educational policies. Many new fields of experimentation have been launched by our school authorities. Some have been found unsuccessful in accomplishing their purpose, and if appellee’s position is upheld, no school board would risk the establishment of any new department, which in the event of failure must be continued or its idle teachers paid. As we have stated before, the purpose of the Tenure Act was to maintain an adequate and competent teaching staff, free from political and personal arbitrary interference, whereby capable and competent teachers might feel secure and more efficiently perform their duty of instruction, but it was not the intention of the legislature to confer any special privileges or immunities upon professional employees to retain permanently their position and pay regardless of a place to work and pupils to be taught; nor was it the intention of the legislature to have the Tenure Act interfere with the control of school policy and the courses of study selected by the administrative bodies; nor was it the intention of the legislature to disrupt a school district’s financial scheme, which must be .operated upon a budget limited by the Code, that cannot be exceeded except in the manner provided by the legislature. If the teacher must be retained in the circumstances b”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Sporie v. Eastern Westmoreland Area Vocational-Technical School

2. ““All legislation must be construed as intending to favor the public interest; when it conflicts with private interests, the public interest to be primarily served is the dominating one, not that of the individual. . ... The Legislature did not intend to confer such privileges and immunities on professional employees as the right to retain their position and pay, without employment in actual work. Furthermore, such a result would militate against forming joint schools, impeding any improvement in our educational system in this respect.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 66 Pa. D. & C. 556 - Montrose Borough v. Chilletti

3. ““. . . For successful operation of these joint schools it is provided that the old districts’ control be transferred to a joint board, with joint though separate control in the districts. This new organization is a distinct separate legal entity from each of the district boards which make it up. . . .””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Schmeidel v. Dauphin Borough School District