Patton v. Coates’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

34 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 34 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “[With regard to Eagle Township,] quite a number of illegal votes were cast for plaintiff by non-residents. That in one or two instances legal voters who had desired to vote for Patton were rejected. That an armed force was around the polls all day. That they were armed with needle guns, rifles and shot guns, and that those so armed were colored men (with one exception) and supporters of the plaintiff. That these guns were stacked immediately around the polls. That fifiy-three men had guns in the afternoon of the day of the election, and that quite a number of them, with their guns, accompanied the officers who brought up the returns to the county clerk. With regard to Eastman [Township, the judge found]: That early in the morning even before the polls were opened, a large crowd of colored men, ranging from two hundred to four hundred, surrounded the polls, a large majority of whom were supporters of plaintiff, and by their conduct made it exceedingly difficult for a colored man, desirous of supporting defendant to deposit his ballot. That supporters of plaintiff would forcibly take their ballots from them, threaten to burn their houses, throw them into the river, turn them out of church, &c., in case they voted for the ticket upon which defendant was a candidate. That, in certain circumstances, voters were so intimidated as either to leave the polls without voting, or had to be conducted to the polls under the protection of white citizens. That one Moore, a colored man, decli”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Alexander v. Davis