State v. Purdy’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

17 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 22 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “"Whatever frail vitality the dual capacity doctrine has in other jurisdictions, we do not think that it warrants adoption here. To do so might undermine extensively the policy sought to be achieved by the workmen’s compensation act. There are endlessly imaginable situations in which an employer might owe duties to the general public, or to non-employees, the breach of which would be asserted to avoid the exclusive liability provision of our statute. It would be an enormous, and perhaps illusory, task to draw a principled line of distinction between those situations in which the employee could sue and those in which he could not. The exclusive liability provision would, in any event, lose much of its effectiveness, and the workmen’s compensation system as a whole might be destabilized. For these reasons, and because of the persuasiveness of case law from other jurisdictions rejecting it, we reject the dual capacity doctrine as the law of this state.” Id. at 260 (footnote omitted). 7”

   7 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. Sauve v. Winfree · Hills v. Salt River Project Ass'n

2. “Exclusiveness of liability. The liability of an employer prescribed in AS 23.30.045 is exclusive and in place of all other liability of the employer and any fellow employee to the employee, the employee’s legal representative, husband or wife, parents, dependents, next of kin, and anyone otherwise entitled to recover damages from the employer or fellow employee at law or in admiralty on account of the injury or death. The liability of the employer is exclusive even if the employee's claim is barred under AS 23.30.022. However, if an employer fails to secure payment of compensation as required by this chapter, an injured employee or the employee's legal representative in case death results from the injury may elect to claim compensation under this chapter, or to maintain an action against the em ployer at law or in admiralty for damages on account of the injury or death. In that action the defendant may not plead as a defense that the injury was caused by the negligence of a fellow servant, or that the employee assumed the risk of the' employment, or that the injury was due to the contributory negligence of the employee.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Williams v. Mammoth of Alaska, Inc.

3. “One general purpose of workmen’s compensation is to provide an assured recovery to an injured employee without regard to notions of fault. In return for the certainty of payment, the law makes the liability exclusive, i.e., it is in place of all other liability to which the employer might be subjected because of the injury. As we observed in Gordon v. Burgess Construction Co., 425 P.2d 602, 604 (Alaska 1967): [T]he remedies provided by a workmen's compensation act are intended to be in lieu of all rights and remedies as to a particular injury whether at common law or otherwise.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Williams v. Mammoth of Alaska, Inc.