Schneider v. Day’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

10 federal appellate · 1 district · 1 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 16 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “If you entertain a reasonable doubt as to any fact or element necessary to constitute the defendant's guilt, it is your duty to give him the benefit of that doubt and return a verdict of not guilty . . . . It must be such doubt as would give rise to a grave uncertainty, raised in your mind by reasons of the unsatisfactory character of the evidence or lack thereof. A reasonable doubt is not a mere possible doubt. It is an actual substantial doubt. It is a doubt that a reasonable man can seriously entertain. What is required is not an absolute or mathematical certainty, but a moral certainty.”

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

2. “that there is no reasonable likelihood that the jury ... applied the instruction in a way that violated the Constitution”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Buford Anthony v. Burl Cain

3. “a serious sensible doubt as such you could give a good reason for”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Buford Anthony v. Burl Cain