Allison v. Briskey’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

4 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 4 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““The law recognizes the right of a witness to consult memoranda in aid of his recollection, under two conditions : First, * * * “In the second class are embraced cases in which the witness, after examining the memorandum can not testify to an existing knowledge of the facts, independent of the memorandum. In other words, cases in which the memorandum fails to refresh and revive the recollection, and thus constitute it present knowledge. If the evidence of knowledge proceed no further than this, neither the memorandum, nor the testimony of the witness, can go before the jury. If, however, the witness go further, and testify that, at or about the time the memorandum was made, he knew its contents, and knew them to be true, this legalizes and lets in both the testimony of the witness and the memorandum. The two are the equivalent of a present, positive statement of the witness, affirming the truth of the contents of the memorandum. 1 Greenl. Ev. §§ 436-437; Bondurant v. State Bank, 7 Ala. 830 .””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. St. Paul Fire & Marine Ins. Co. v. Johnson