Eberhart v. State’s Empirical Analysis
1873
Citation profile
8 federal appellate · 75 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 90 later decisions (1 by the Supreme Court) — most recently September 2020 · most notably 577 So. 2d 474 - Kuenzel v. State (1990), Drake v. Kemp (1985)
8 federal appellate · 75 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.
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 90 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“With reference to doing a higher duty and protecting society as opposed to the duty of rehabilitation, we would like to quote from a noted legal scholar in the 1800’s. I think the Court is well aware of this particular passage: (Reading): “We have, however, no sympathy with that sickly sentimentality that springs into action whenever a criminal is at length about to suffer for crime. This may be a sign of a tender heart, but it is also a sign of one not under proper regulation. Society demands that crime shall be punished and criminals warned, and the false humanity that starts and shudders when the axe of justice is ready to strike, is a dangerous element for the peace of society. We have had too much of this mercy. It is not true mercy. It only looks to the criminal, but we must insist upon mercy to society, upon justice to the poor victim whose blood cries out against his or her violators. That criminals go unpunished is a disgrace to our civilization, and we have reaped the fruits of it in the frequency in which bloody deeds occur. A stern, unbending, unflinching administration of the penal laws, as it is the highest mark of civilization, is also the surest mode to prevent the commission of offenses.””
2 later decisions quote this exact passagee.g. Wilson v. Kemp · Potts v. Zant“that sickly sentimentality that springs into action whenever a criminal is at length about to suffer for crime,”
2 later decisions 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.