Murphy v. Houma Well Service’s Empirical Analysis
413 F.2d 509 · 1969
Citation profile
1 federal appellate · 2 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 5 later decisions — most recently January 2022
1 federal appellate · 2 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 Griswold v. State of Connecticut · Levy v. Louisiana Ex Rel. Charity Hospital · Murphy v. Houma Well Service · Glona v. American Guarantee & Liability Insurance · Feazel v. Feazel
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 5 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““As the presumption of legitimacy is clearly applicable here, we come, then, to the question of determining its conclusiveness on the parties before the Court. The Civil Code provides generally that in cases in which the presumption is subject to attack, the presumed father, if he intends to dispute legitimacy, must institute an action to disavow paternity * * * within a prescribed period after the child is born or after he discovers its existence. Likewise, if the husband dies without having disputed legitimacy, his heirs are given a short time to make objection to the status of the child. In the instant ease, however, neither Edward Fontenot nor his mother resorted to the procedure afforded by statute. ****** “Accordingly, since neither Edward Fontenot nor his mother (and heir), Mrs. Eva Fontenot, instituted the requisite statutory procedures, under state law Romona Gail is conclusively presumed to be the child of Edward Fontenot. As his child, she is the statutory beneficiary under the Jones Act and is entitled to whatever recovery might be had for his death.””
1 later decision quote this exact passage
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.