Jordan v. Swope’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

24 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 24 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““Petitioner urges that there has been a loss of jurisdiction by the trial court, precluding any further proceedings upon the conviction, and leaving no .alternative but an absolute discharge. .No doubt the time has passed within ■which courts retain power to modify, alter, or change their judgments. But •we propose no modification. In ac- • cordance with petitioner’s own contention, and at his instance, we have .found what so far has passed for a judgment, to be a nullity. It is a general principle that a void judgment may be ignored whenever and wherever encountered, and that the inherent power of the courts to vacate such a judgment was not at common law limited to the term, and is not now limited by the several statutes. Oliver v. Enriquez, 17 N.M. 206 , 124 P. 798 ; Kerr v. Southwest Fluorite Co., 35 N.M. 232 , 294 P. 324 . For the same reason that this void judgment has yielded to collateral attack, it has not served to terminate the court’s jurisdiction. In legal contemplation, petitioner has never been sentenced upon his conviction for uttering fraudulent checks. He is in the same situation as if, having escaped from custody after verdict and before sentence, he were but now reapprehended. This view was taken in Ex parte Howard, supra [ 72 Kan. 273 , 83 P. 1032 ].””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. State v. Sorrows

2. ““ * * * Justice to the state requires that the illegal judgment be replaced by a valid one. Justice to the ■petitioner requires no more. It would be a weakness in the law and an undue yielding to individual right to hold that a convicted person may stand by without objection while a void judgment is rendered, and then escape all consequences of his guilt by attacking •collaterally the legality of his restraint. Had he excepted to the sentence and appealed, his only relief would have 'been a reversal and a remand of the ■cause for new sentence. * * * ””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. State v. Sorrows