Ex parte Roundtree’s Empirical Analysis
1874
Citation profile
50 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 55 later decisions (2 by the Supreme Court) — most recently April 1988 · most notably Ex Parte Burch (1938), Ex parte Phenix Insurance (1886)
50 state decisions — followed in 13 states
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 Nugent v. State · Gaines v. Harvin · Balkum v. State · Randolph v. Baldwin · State v. Hudnal
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 55 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““Excepting the words, 'and such persons as may be by law invested with powers of a judicial nature’, the section of the present constitution which we have quoted, simply expresses, in a single clause that which was evident from the several sections of the constitution of 1819, establishing the judicial department of the government, and distributing the judicial power. The words, ‘and such persons as may be by law invested with powers of a judicial nature’, were introduced into the present constitution, from abundant caution. It was for a time, under the constitution of 1819, a vexed question, whether the general assembly could, by enactment, confer such powers on other than constitutional judicial officers. The convenience and interest of the community often demanded the vesting of such powers in ministerial officers, who could exercise them more expeditiously than the regular judicial tribunals. There were many statutes passed to subserve this convenience and interest; among others, statutes authorizing the clerk of the circuit court, or the register in chancery, to fill vacancies in.-, trusteeships, by the appointment of trustees. The validity of such enactments came before this court, in the case of Gaines v. Harvin ( 19 Ala. 491 ), and was affirmed. These words, therefore, merely declare the judicial construction which the constitution would have borne without them.””
1 later decision quote this exact passagee.g. Ex Parte Darnell““If the court is one of established jurisdiction, a plea that the subject-matter of a particular suit lies without its jurisdiction, or that the party is not amenable to its cognizance, will ordinarily afford full relief. But when the question involves the legal existence and construction of a court — a denial of all jurisdiction, and not of the particular jurisdiction proposed to be exercised — a prohibition, it seems to us, is the only adequate remedy.””
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.