State v. Whitman’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

5 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 5 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “Someone has very wisely said in substance of the crime in question that it is easy to charge, hard to prove, and still harder to defend against. It is a matter of common knowledge that men who ordinarily compose juries will not think or act dispassionately on a case of this sort. By far too frequently does the mere charge raise the cry of the mob, `Crucify him! Crucify him!' Taking advantage of this, it is easy for one having ill feeling against the accused to work up a case involving a little girl and arouse the indignation natural in the breast of everyone who has a heart above a beast. The influence of a possibly designing mother over such a child is so great tending to a fabricated story that the legal rights of the defendant ought to be strictly guarded. * * *”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. State v. Campbell

2. “* * * Where, however, as in the case at bar, the girl assaulted is under legal age to yield consent to her degradation, no such inference can arise, and her failure to make complaint is immaterial.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. State v. Campbell

3. “the prosecutrix is younger than the age of consent, the reason of the rule fails, and with it the admissibility of the testimony perishes.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. State v. Campbell