Abdella v. Smith’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

26 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 30 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““Most of the litigation as to private nuisance has dealt with the conflicting interests of landowners and the question of the reasonableness of the defendant’s conduct: The defendant’s privilege of making a reasonable use of his own property for his own benefit and conducting his affairs in his own way is no less important than the plaintiff’s right to use and enjoy his premises. The two are correlative and interdependent, and neither is entitled to prevail entirely, at the expense of the other. Some balance must be struck between the two. The plaintiff must be expected to endure some inconvenience rather than curtail the defendant’s freedom of action, and the defendant must so use his own property that he causes no unreasonable harm to the plaintiff. The law of private nuisance is very largely a series of adjustments to limit the reciprocal rights and privileges of both. In every case the court must make a comparative evaluation of the conflicting interests according to objective legal standards, and the gravity of the harm to the plaintiff must be weighed against the utility of the defendant’s conduct.” Prosser, Law of Torts, sec. 89, p. 596 (2d ed. 1971) (Citations omitted).”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 108 Wis. 2d 223 - Prah v. Maretti

2. ““ [P] igs cannot be raised in the city, hence they must be raised on the farm. If they are raised there under conditions as clean and sanitary as can reasonably be attained considering the characteristics of the animal and the necessity for confinement in close quarters, the fact that odors from those quarters are carried abroad on the summer breeze will not make an actionable nuisance.” Clark v. Wambold, 165 Wis. 70, 71-72 , 160 N.W. 1039 (1917).”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 104 Wis. 2d 506 - State v. Quality Egg Farm, Inc.

3. ““A plaintiff, of course, is not ipso facto barred from relief in the courts merely because of ‘coming to the nuisance,’ but it is a factor which bears upon the ques tion of whether the plaintiff used his land reasonably under the circumstances. See Prosser, supra, page 632, sec. 92; Walsh on Equity, page 192.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 79 Wis. 2d 10 - Capt. Soma Boat Line, Inc. v. City of Wisconsin Dells