Curran v. Williams’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

7 federal appellate · 3 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 18 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “The purpose in permitting a stipulation of damages as compensation is to render certain and definite that which appears to be uncertain and not easily proven. The courts recognize that the parties, particularly at the time of execution of the instrument, are in as good a position as anyone to arrive at a fair amount of damages for a subsequent breach. In the event they are not unconscionable or excessive courts will not disturb it. Just compensation for the injuries sustained is the principle at which the law attempts to arrive.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Exemplar Manufacturing Co. v. Lear Corp. (In Re Exemplar Manufacturing Co.)

2. “Where damages are difficult of ascertainment, courts will respect the honest attempt of the parties themselves to compute as best they can the just compensation from loss of the bargain by breach. Before accepting as conclusive the convention of the parties, it must be examined, and the court must determine whether the predetermined figure is really in the nature of an attempted computation of the actual damages likely to result, or whether it has the effect of exacting a penalty from the contract breaker.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Exemplar Manufacturing Co. v. Lear Corp. (In Re Exemplar Manufacturing Co.)

3. “more intimately associated with the circumstances and therefore better able to compute the actual or probable damages than ... a court or jury after breach.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Exar Corporation v. Nartron Corporation