Bowen v. State’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

2 district · 21 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 25 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““. . . (T)he principles settled by Corlew case could be used to reach the same conclusion. In that opinion the Court said: “ ‘Assessment by the jury of the punishment upon conviction is not a right reserved to the jury by the Constitution. “The right to have the jury assess the punishment was not a part of the right of trial by jury at common law.” Woods v. State, 130 Tenn. 100 , at page 107, 169 S.W. 558 , at page 559, L.R.A.1915F, 531 citing Durham v. State, 89 Tenn. 723 , 18 S.W. 74 , and cases from other jurisdictions. “ ‘It may be added that such practice (that of the Supreme Court fixing a reduced penalty when required to do so by the record before it or by law) is well established in civil cases, both in the trial Courts and in this Court, Branch v. Bass, 37 Tenn. 366 ; Railroad Co. v. Roberts, 113 Tenn. 488 , 82 S.W. 314 , 67 L.R.A. 495 ; and the power of the appellate courts to modify and reduce imprisonment in criminal cases, and “render such judgment on the record as the law demands,” Code, Sec. 11810, is quite generally recognized and exercised. See Annotations, 29 A.L.R., 318 , and 34 A.L.R., 1477, 1486, 1487 .’ “While this Court did not apply these principles to the fullest extent it might have applied them in the Corlew case, choosing instead to reduce the penalty from a maximum sentence of three years for grand larceny to the minimum sentence of one year for petit larceny, it might have done otherwise.””

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. Lay v. State · Collins v. State

2. “The answer to the ... question must be that the judgments entered by the United States Supreme Court in the Fur-man, Jackson, and Branch cases had no direct effect whatsoever on the judgment in this case. [[Image here]] There is no case in point to cite in support of this statement. It is supported, however, by accepted fundamental rules of law relating to the finality of judgments. This proposition is stated in 46 Am.Jur.2d, Judgments, § 14, p. 322, this way: Indeed, it is a general principle that where a court has jurisdiction over the person and the subject matter, and the judgment rendered is not in excess of the jurisdiction or power of the court, no error or irregularity can make the judgment void. Such a judgment may be, under proper circumstances, voidable, but until avoided is regarded as valid.”

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

3. “*** It is well settled that a commutation of a sentence is a substitution of a less for a greater punishment. After commutation the commuted sentence is the only one in existence, and the only one to be considered. After commutation, the sentence has the same legal effect, and the status of the prisoner is the same, as though the sentence had originally been for the commuted term. Johnson v. State, (Ala.) 63 South. 163 ; In re Hall, 34 Neb. 206, 209 , 51 N.W. 750 , 5 Op. of Attys. Gen. (U.S.) 370); Lee v. Murphy, 22 Grat. (Va.) 789, 799, 12 Am. Rep. 563 . . .””

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