Smith v. Cole’s Empirical Analysis
1989
Citation profile
53 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 53 later decisions — most recently May 2015 · most notably 625 So. 2d 1007 - Barrie v. VP Exterminators, Inc. (1993), State on Behalf of Hopkins v. Batt (1998)
53 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.
Relationships
Relies on Stanley v. Illinois · Lehr v. Robertson · Quilloin v. Walcott · McKesson Corp. v. Division of Alcoholic Beverages & Tobacco · Weber v. Aetna Casualty & Surety Co.
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 53 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““The presumption [of legitimacy] was intended to protect innocent children from the stigma attached to illegitimacy and to prevent case-by-case determinations of paternity. It was not intended to shield biological fathers from their support obligations.... The presumed father’s acceptance of paternal responsibilities, either by intent or default, does not enure to the benefit of the biological father. It is the fact of biological paternity or maternity which obliges parents to nourish their children.””
5 later decisions quote this exact passage“... take direct civil action, including actions to establish filiation against an alleged biological parent notwithstanding the existence of a legal presumption that another person is the parent of the child solely for the purpose of fulfilling its responsibility under this Section ... A separate and distinct cause of action in favor of the department is hereby created, and suits brought under this provision need not be ancillary to or dependent upon any other legal proceeding.”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage“The best interest of the child should be considered in determining whether the court in a given case will impose the obligation of support on the person who, by virtue of Article 184, is conclusively presumed to be the father of the child. While LSA-C.C. art. 227 may provide the basis for such an imposition on the legal father, the fact that there is a biological father capable of providing support cannot equitably be ignored.”
3 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.