State v. Douglas’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

4 federal appellate · 45 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 49 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “"He is a competent witness under our statute, but SDC 34.3636 changes the common law rule which permitted conviction on the uncorroborated testimony of such accomplice, by prohibiting such conviction. This statute crystalized in a rule of positive law what was already a rule of practice which courts regarded themselves as bound to observe, for it has long been the practice both in England and America for the Court not only to caution the jury as to the danger of acting upon the unsupported testimony of an accomplice, and to advise them not to convict unless there is some corroborating evidence. "While the decisions under the statute are not free from confusion and it is said that the law has been thought not free from doubt and embarrassment as to the absolute duty of the trial Court to so instruct and as to whether failure to do so is reversible error, People v. Clough, 73 Cal. 348 , 15 P. 5 ; Commonwealth v. Savory, 64 Mass. 535 , 10 Cush. 535 , we think that the weight of authority in states whose statute is like ours is that at least where such instruction is requested it is reversible error to refuse it in any case where the testimony of the accomplice is necessary to establish facts essential to defendant's guilt. (Citations omitted) "In many of these cases the logic and reason for the rule is not stated. The reason is of course that SDC 34.3636 states a positive rule of law which is part of the law of the case. * * * * * * * * * "In the light of all this the Court shou”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. State v. Beene

2. ““In Myers v. Seaberger, 45 Ohio St. 232 , 12 N.E. 796 , 798, the phrase ‘or otherwise controlled by him’ in a statute requiring the listing for taxation of ‘all moneys invested, loaned, or otherwise controlled by him as agent or attorney, or on account of any other person or persons’, must be construed to mean controlled in a manner similar to the loaning and investing of money. In a statute prohibiting the selling, giving or otherwise disposing of intoxicating liquors without a license, the words ‘or otherwise dispose of’ must be construed to refer to a disposition of the same class as a sale or gift. Roberson v. State, 100 Ala. 37 , 14 So. 554 , 555. ‘Otherwise improve’ following the words ‘to open, widen, and extend’ a street refers only to such improvements as are like opening and widening and must be limited to the preceding language of the section. Methodist Episcopal Church v. City of Wyandotte, 31 Kan. 721 , 3 P. 527 , 530. “General and specific words in a statute which are associated together and which are capable of an analogous meaning take color from each other so that the general words are restricted to a sense analogous to the less general. The general words are deemed to have been used not to the wide extent which they might bear if standing alone, but as related to words of more definite and particular meaning with which they are associated. The term ‘otherwise’ when preceded by a specific enumeration is commonly given a restricted meaning and limited to artic”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Green River Development Co. v. FMC Corp.

3. ““The crime charged is, in effect, an embezzlement of the funds of the State. It is usually held that the proper venue for embezzlement is the county where the act of appropriation or conversion took place and it has been held that the venue of the indictment charging an embezzlement consisting of a failure to account should be laid in the county where the accused was liable to account. 18 Am.Jur. 611 § 65 and the following cases more or less directly support the rule: Rogers v. State, 14 Okl.Cr. 235 , 170 P. 269 , L.R.A.1918E, 742; People v. Gordon, 133 Cal. 328 , 65 P. 746 , 85 Am.St.Rep. 174 ; State v. Hengen, 106 Iowa 711 , 77 N.W. 453 ; Hopkins v. State, 52 Fla. 39 , 42 So. 52 ; People v. Davis, 269 Ill. 256 , 110 N.E. 9 ; Kossakowski v. People, 177 Ill. 563 , 53 N.E. 115 ; State v. Bailey, 50 Ohio St. 636 , 36 N.E. 233 * * *”.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Williams v. State