Commonwealth v. Root’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

3 federal appellate · 140 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 143 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “The testimony, which is uncontradicted in material part, discloses that, on the night of the fatal accident, the defendant accepted the deceased’s challenge to engage in an automobile race; that the racing took place on a rural 3-lane highway; that the night was clear and dry, and traffic light; that the speed limit on the highway was 50 miles per hour; that, immediately prior to the accident, the two automobiles were being operated at varying speeds of from 70 to 90 miles per hour; that the accident occurred in a no-passing zone on the approach to a bridge where the highway narrowed to two directionally-opposite lanes; that, at the time of the accident, the defendant was in the lead and was proceeding in his right-hand lane of travel; that the the deceased, in an attempt to pass the defendant’s automobile, when a truck was closely approaching from the opposite direction, swerved his car to the left, crossed the highway’s white dividing line and drove his automobile on the wrong side of the highway head-on into the oncoming truck with resultant fatal effect to himself. Root, supra, 403 Pa. at 573 , 170 A.2d at 310-311 .”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 285 Pa. Super. 34 - Commonwealth v. Lang

2. ““While precedent is to be found for application of the tort law concept of ‘proximate cause’ in fixing responsibility for criminal homicide the want of any rational basis for its use in determining criminal liability can no longer be properly disregarded. When proximate cause was first borrowed from the field of tort law and applied to homicide prosecutions in Pennsylvania, the concept noted as much more direct causal relation in producing the alleged culpable result than it does today. Proximate cause, as an essential element of a tort founded in negligence, has undergone in recent times, and still undergoing, a marked extension ... To persist in applying the tort liability concept of proximate cause to prosecutions for criminal homicide after the marked expansion of civil liability of defendants in tort actions for negligence would be to extend possible criminal liability to persons chargeable with unlawful or reckless conduct in circumstances not generally considered to present the likelihood of a resultant death.” Commonwealth v. Root, supra, 403 Pa. at 574-575 , 170 A.2d at 311 .”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 340 Pa. Super. 278 - Commonwealth v. Colvin

3. “In [Commonwealth v. Levin, 184 Pa.Super. 436 , 135 A.2d 764 (1957)] two cars were racing on the streets of Philadelphia at speeds estimated at from 85 to 95 miles per hour. The defendant’s car, in the left hand lane, was racing alongside of the car in which the deceased was a passenger when the defendant turned his automobile sharply to the right in front of the other car thereby causing the driver of the latter car to lose control and smash into a tree, the passenger being thrown to the road and killed as a result of the impact. . .. Levin’s act of cutting his automobile sharply in front of the car in which the deceased was riding directly forced that car off of the road and into the tree. The defendant’s reckless and unlawful maneuver was the direct cause of the crucial fatality.”

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