Dale v. Bartels’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

6 federal appellate · 3 district ·

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

1. “The function of witnesses is fundamental to the administration of justice. The court’s judgment is based on their testimony and they are given every encouragement to make a full disclosure of all pertinent information within their knowledge. 1 Harper & James, supra at 424 . The common law perceived that the policy of encouraging a witness’ free and uninhibited cooperation in the fact-finding process would best be served by insulating the witness from the threat of civil liability for his testimony. Without such immunity, the witness might gauge each of his statements in terms of the possibility of his own personal liability and, therefore, lack the candor and freedom of expression considered essential to the proper functioning of the judicial process. See Veeder, Absolute Immunity in Defamation: Judicial Proceedings, 9 Colum.L.Rev. 463, 469 (1909). The resulting lack of any civil remedy against the dishonest witness “is simply part of the price that is paid for wit nesses who are free from intimidation by the possibility of civil liability for what they say.” Prosser, supra at 778.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the concurrence
   e.g. Lettis v. United States Postal Service