Wattigny v. Lambert’s Empirical Analysis
1981
Citation profile
1 federal appellate · 40 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 42 later decisions — most recently February 2014 · most notably 935 So. 2d 669 - Kennedy v. Sheriff of East Baton Rouge (2006), 728 So. 2d 931 - Steed v. ST. PAUL'S UNITED METH. CHURCH (1999)
1 federal appellate · 40 state decisions
Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.
Relationships
Relies on New York Times Co. v. Sullivan · Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc. · Arceneaux v. Domingue · Canter v. Koehring Company · 341 So. 2d 332 - Coco v. Winston Industries, Inc.
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 42 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“"A statement is defamatory when it tends to expose a person to contempt, hatred, ridicule or obloquy; or which causes a person to be shunned or avoided; or which has a tendency to deprive him of the benefits of public confidence or injure him in his occupation; and includes almost any language which upon its face has a natural tendency to injure the person's reputation, either generally or with respect to his occupation. The intent and meaning of an alleged defamatory statement must be gathered not only from the words singled out as libelous but from the context as well, and the true meaning must be ascertained from a consideration of all parts of the statement as well as the circumstances of its publication. The test is the effect the article is fairly calculated to produce and the impression it would naturally engender in the minds of the average persons among whom it is intended to circulate."”
5 later decisions quote this exact passage“"Petitioner was wrongfully imprisoned and detained in said jail at an exorbitant bail figure, set and obtained at the instance of defendants, until Monday, March 3, 1975."”
1 later decision quote this exact passage“Malice, arising from the publication of a false and injurious charge, without probable cause for thinking the charge is true, suffices [to sustain the action for libel].”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Costello v. Hardy
How this case has been treated — in progress
Whether each later court followed, distinguished, criticized, or overruled this decision. The treatment classification (task #35) runs highest-cited cases first and lights up here as it reaches this one.