Duke v. Housen’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

2 federal appellate · 7 district · 66 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 76 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “They are pragmatic devices to save courts from stale claim litigation and spare citizens from having to defend when memories have faded, witnesses are unavailable by death or disappearance and evidence is lost.”

   6 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. Vanasse v. Ramsay · Nowotny v. L & B Contract Industries, Inc.

2. “"(a) Civil actions other than for the recovery of real property can only be brought within the following periods after the cause of action accrues: "(i) Within ten (10) years, an action upon a specialty or any contract agreement or promise in writing * * *."”

   5 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the dissent
   e.g. DeWitt v. Balben · Baker v. First National Bank of Denver

3. ““1. A duty, or obligation, recognized by the law, requiring the actor to conform to a certain standard of conduct, for the protection of others against unreasonable risks. “2. A failure on his part to conform to the standard required. These two elements go to make up what the courts usually have called negligence; but the term quite frequently is applied to the second alone. Thus it may be said that the defendant was negligent, but is not liable because he was under no duty to the plaintiff not to be. “3. A reasonable close causal connection between the conduct and the resulting injury. This is what is commonly known as ‘legal cause,’ or ‘proximate cause.’ “4. Actual loss or damage resulting to the interests of another. Since the action for negligence developed chiefly out of the old form of action on the case, it retained the rule of that action, that proof of damage was an essential part of the plaintiff’s case. Nominal damages, to vindicate a technical right, cannot be recovered in a negligence action, where no actual loss has occurred. The threat of future harm, not yet realized, is not enough. Negligent conduct in itself is not such an interference with the interests of the world at large that there is any right to complain of it, or to be free from it, except in the case of some individual whose interests have suffered.” (Footnotes omitted and emphasis added.)”

   3 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. ABC Builders, Inc. v. Phillips · Bird v. Rozier