Spier v. Barker’s Empirical Analysis
1974
Citation profile
18 federal appellate · 7 district · 95 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 165 later decisions — most recently March 2017 · most notably Waterson v. General Motors Corp. (1988), Vizzini v. Ford Motor Co. (1977)
18 federal appellate · 7 district · 95 state decisions — followed in 20 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.
Relationships
Relies on Bentzler v. Braun · 91 Ill. App. 2d 1 - Mount v. McClellan · Sams v. Sams · Mays v. Dealers Transit, Inc. · Robinson v. Bone
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 165 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“[T]he seat belt affords the automobile occupant an unusual and ordinarily unavailable means by which he or she may minimize his or her damages prior to the accident.... [T]he burden of buckling an available seat belt may, under the facts of the particular case, be found by the jury to be less than the likelihood of injury when multiplied by its accompanying severity.”
5 later decisions quote this exact passage“the doctrine of contributory negligence is applicable only if the plaintiff's failure to exercise due care causes, in whole or in part, the accident, rather than when it merely exacerbates or enhances the severity of his injuries,”
4 later decisions quote this exact passage“likelihood of ejection and [use] frequently prevents `the second collision' of the occupant with the interior of the vehicle.”
4 later decisions quote this exact passage
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.