Cheesman v. Shreeve’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

5 federal appellate · 1 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 8 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““Those acts were not drawn by geologists or for geologists. They were not framed in the interests of science, and consequently with scientific accuracy in the use of terms. They were framed for the protection of miners in the claims which they had located and developed, and should receive such a construction as will carry out this purpose. The use of the terms ‘vein’ and ‘lode’ in connection with each other in the act of 1866, and, their use in the act of 1872, would seem to indicate that it was the object of the legislator to avoid any limitation in the application of the acts, which a scientific definition of any one of these terms might impose. It is difficult to give any definition of the term, as understood and used in the acts of Congress, which will not he subject to criticism. A fissure in the earth’s crust, an opening in its rocks and strata made by some force of nature, in which the mineral is deposited, would seem to be essential to the definition of a lode, in the judgment of geologists. But to the practical miner the fissure and its walls are only of importance as indicating the boundaries within which he may look for and reasonably expect to find the ore he seeks. A continuous body of mineralized rock, lying within any other well-defined boundaries on the earth’s surface and under it, would equally constitute, in his eyes, a lode. We are of opinion, therefore, that the term as used in the acts of Congress is applicable to any zone or belt of mineralized rock lyi”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. San Francisco Chemical Co. v. Duffield

2. “* * * (I)f ground once included within the location of a lode mining claim be abandoned, and a new location made thereon, as abandoned ground, said location dates only from the relocation thereof as abandoned ground, and does not relate back to or obtain any rights on account of the location which has been abandoned, * * *.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. United States v. Consolidated Mines & Smelting Co.