Harris v. Runnels’s Empirical Analysis
53 U.S. 79 · 1851
Citation profile
27 federal appellate · 10 district · 107 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 189 later decisions (12 by the Supreme Court) — most recently September 2022 · most notably National Bank v. Matthews (1878), Cooper Manuf'G Co of Mount Vernon Ohio v. Ferguson (1885)
27 federal appellate · 10 district · 107 state decisions — followed in 32 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 Wheeler v. Russell · Thredgill v. Pintard · Hunt v. Knickerbacker · Amory v. M'Gregor
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 189 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““It is true that a statute, containing a prohibition and a penalty, makes the act which it punishes unlawful, and the same may be implied from a penalty without a prohibition; but it does not follow that the unlawfulness of the act was meant by the Legislature to avoid a contract made in contravention of it.””
12 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority““Lord Mansfield said, with a very proper sensibility of the injustice of such a plea, and of the policy which permits it to be insisted upon: ‘The objection, that a contract is immoral or illegal as between plaintiff and defendant, sounds at all times very ill in the mouth of a defendant. It is not for his sake, however, that the objection is ever allowed, but it is founded on general principles of policy, which the defendant has the advantage of, contrary to the real justice, as between him and the plaintiff.’ ””
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority““It is a rule, if effects and. consequences shall result from an interpretation oij a statute contrary and in opposition to the policy which it discloses, * * * such an interpretation must be rejected.””
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
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.