Starr v. Pease’s Empirical Analysis
1831
Citation profile
3 federal appellate · 26 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 32 later decisions (2 by the Supreme Court) — most recently January 2019 · most notably Maynard v. Hill (1888), State v. Clemente (1974)
3 federal appellate · 26 state decisions — followed in 15 states
Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.
Relationships
Relies on Calder et Wife, v. Bull et Wife.
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 32 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“The law has. remained in substance the same as it was when enacted in 1667. During all this period the legislature has interfered like, the Parliament of Great Britain, and passed special acts of divorce a vinculo matrimonii-y and at almost every session since the Constitution- of the United States Avent into operation, noAV forty-two years, and. for thirteen years of the existence of the constitution of Connecticut, such acts have been, in multiplied cases,' passed and sanctioned by the constituted authorities of our State. We are not at liberty to inquire into the Avisdom of our existing laAv "on this subject; nor into the expediency of such frequent interference by the legislature.' We can only inquire into the constitutionality of the act under consideration. The power is not prohibited either by the Con stitution of the United States or by that of the State. In view of the appalling consequences of declaring the general law of the State or the repeated acts of our legislature unconstitutional and void — consequences easily conceived but not easily expressed, such as bastardizing the issue and subjecting the parties to .punishment for adultery — the court should come to the result only on a solemn conviction that their oaths of office and these constitutions imperiously demand it. .Feeling myself no such conviction, I cannot pronounce the act void.”
1 later decision quote this exact passagee.g. Maynard v. Hill
How this case has been treated — in progress
Whether each later court followed, distinguished, criticized, or overruled this decision. The treatment classification (task #35) runs highest-cited cases first and lights up here as it reaches this one.