O'Donnell v. Elgin, Joliet & Eastern Railway Co.’s Empirical Analysis
338 U.S. 384 · 1949
Citation profile
318 federal appellate · 26 district · 140 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 636 later decisions (22 by the Supreme Court) — most recently August 2020 · most notably Kernan v. American Dredging Co. (1958), Affolder v. New York, Chicago & St. Louis Railroad (1950)
318 federal appellate · 26 district · 140 state decisions — followed in 23 states
Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.
Appellate journey
reviewedO'Donnell v. Elgin, Joliet & Eastern Ry. Co. (from Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals)
Relationships
Relies on Seaboard Air Line Railway v. Horton · Chesapeake Ohio Railway Company v. Addie Kelly · Johnson v. Southern Pacific Co. · St Louis Iron Mountain Southern Railway Company v. May Taylor W · Ellis v. Union Pacific Railroad
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 636 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“[A] failure of equipment to perform as required by the [FSAA] is in itself an actionable wrong, in no way dependent upon negligence and for the proximate results of which there is liability--a liability that cannot be escaped by proof of care or diligence.”
14 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“It shall be unlawful for any common carrier engaged in interstate commerce by railroad to haul or permit to be hauled or used on its line any car used in moving interstate traffic not equipped with couplers coupling automatically by impact, and which can be uncoupled without the necessity of men going between the ends of the cars.”
8 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the dissent““Pleadings will serve the purpose of sharpening and limiting the issues only if claims based on negligence are set forth separately from those based on violation of the appliance acts.””
4 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
How this case has been treated — in progress
Whether each later court followed, distinguished, criticized, or overruled this decision. The treatment classification (task #35) runs highest-cited cases first and lights up here as it reaches this one.