State v. Harris’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

13 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 13 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “[l]ong-established constitutional doctrine makes clear that, beyond the requirement [that the defendant receive a credit toward his second sentence for the time served following the first sentence], the guarantee against double jeopardy imposes no restrictions upon the length of a sentence imposed upon reconviction. [I]t has been settled that a corollary of the power to retry a defendant is the power, upon the defendant’s reconviction, to impose whatever sentence may be legally authorized, whether or not it is greater than the sentence imposed after the first conviction. Although the rationale for this “well-established part of our constitutional jurisprudence” has been variously verbalized, it rests ultimately upon the premise that the original conviction has, at the defendant’s behest, been wholly nullified and the slate wiped clean.... The conviction has been set aside and the unexpired portion of the original sentence will never be served. A new trial may result in an acquittal. But if it does result in a conviction, we cannot say that the constitutional guarantee against double jeopardy of its own weight restricts the imposition of an otherwise lawful single punishment for the offense in question.”

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

2. “the State with all its resources and power should not be allowed to make repeated attempts to convict an individual for an alleged offense, thereby subjecting him to embarrassment, expense and ordeal and compelling him to live in a continuing state of anxiety and insecurity, as well as enhancing the possibility that even though innocent he may be found guilty.”

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

3. “We, as the Supreme Court of Tennessee, have the full and final power to interpret our state constitution. Tennessee, and every state, has the sovereign right to adopt in its own Constitution individual liberties more expansive than those conferred by the Federal Constitution.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the dissent
   e.g. State v. Gomez