437 So. 2d 37 - Pennington v. State’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

26 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 26 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “[t]he trial judge should always permit attorneys to make a record of objectionable testimony or proffer of same in order that this Court may know whether it is relevant or material.”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. Edwards v. Booker · 875 So. 2d 230 - Robinson v. State

2. “Put in historical context I find what we are doing all the more disturbing. For years our courts were governed by rigid rules of pleading and practice. One false step by the pleader and his client's claim was lost forever. If the proof varied from the cause of action pled, that too could be fatal. We endured such foolishness as the two witness rule, the necessity for waiving answer under oath in chancery, and so much more. In the past two decades our rules of practice have gradually undergone long overdue corrective surgery. The primary impetus for these reforms has been that ultimately irrepressible imperative of substantial justice, coupled with a realistic recognition of what it is like to practice law. One by one, needless technicalities have been discarded. I had thought we were approaching the point where lawyer and litigant could concentrate on the merits of the case, without having their attention constantly diverted by a procedural mine field. I fear my optimism has been premature. In a very real sense, this case shows that the cancer has not been uprooted at all. It has simply changed its home. It has come to rest in the appellate process. More and more, appeals to this Court are marked by controversies over the preservation of error, not the justice of the case. Procedural bars are invoked here as demurrers were once filed in the trial courts. We have merely changed the location of the mine field — with the familiar results: Needless consumption of judicial resourc”

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

3. “Although the lower court here did not permit appellant's counsel to make a record and no real proffer was made by dictating into the record what the appellant desired to show by the testimony and by the evidence, appellant's counsel did state that the purpose of the evidence was to show what a simple process it is to remove a latent fingerprint from a cigar box. That officially indicates to this Court what was the purpose of the evidence.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 759 So. 2d 1092 - Vaughan v. State