Severance v. Patterson’s Empirical Analysis
2011
Citation profile
2 state decisions
Relationships
Applies 26 U.S.C. § 165
Relies on Penn Central Transportation Co. v. New York City · Pennsylvania Coal Co. v. Mahon · Lucas v. South Carolina Coastal Council · Nollan v. California Coastal Commission · Dolan v. City of Tigard
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 2 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“1. Does Texas recognize a “rolling” public beachfront access easement, i.e., an easement in favor of the public that allows access to and use of the beaches on the Gulf of Mexico, the boundary of which easement migrates solely according to naturally caused changes in the location of the vegetation line, without proof of prescription, dedication or customary rights in the property so occupied? 2. If Texas recognizes such an easement, is it derived from common law doctrines or from a construction of the [Open Beaches Act]? 3. To what extent, if any, would a landowner be entitled to receive compensation (other than the amount already offered for removal of the houses) under Texas’s law or Constitution for the limitations on use of her property effected by the landward migration of a rolling easement onto property on which no public easement has been found by dedication, prescription, or custom?”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority“Since a simple legislative declaration of policy, [such as declaring a right to an easement across private property], cannot provide the requisite due process, the affirmative policy statement of the Open Beaches Act, without more would appear patently unconstitutional. The legislature has apparently sought to avoid such constitutional problems by qualifying affirmatively-declared public rights with an interesting condition precedent. That condition is that the public must have already acquired these identical rights under the common law doctrines of prescription or dedication.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the concurrence“any beach area, whether publicly or privately owned, extending inland from the line of mean low tide to the line of vegetation bordering on the Gulf of Mexico to which the public has acquired the right of use or easement to or over the area by prescription, dedication, presumption, or has retained a right by virtue of continuous right in the public since time immemorial, as recognized in law and custom. This definition does not include a beach that is not accessible by a public road or public ferry as provided in Section 61.021 of this code.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the concurrence
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.