McMaster v. One Dredge’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

3 federal appellate · 5 district ·

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

1. ““Tried by this criterion, the work and labor and materials furnished in this ease were for the building of the vessel. It can make no difference whether the scow was already built, and had theretofore been used for another purpose, or whether it was newly constructed for the purposes of a dredge. The purpose of this contract was to build this scow into a dredge. As a mere wood barge, the things done were not required. It was only for the purposes of a dredge, which, in its relation with the scow, was a new thing, that the work and labor in this case were performed, and the materials furnished; and this is a building of the dredge, within the rule adopted in the casesl cited. What was done and supplied in this case was for the purpose of making the vessel what it was intended to be, and what it had theretofore not been, a dredge, a thing with which the wood scow, as such, had no relation. This contract, therefore, was not a maritime contract. It was a contract to convert the wood scow into a dredge, which is precisely the same as one to build a dredge.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. The Dredge A.

2. ““After the hull, constructed by other persons, was sufficiently advanced, it was launched, towed to the libelant’s yard, and the machinery there put in, by the libelant company, and by the preceding company, with changes of detail from time to time in the course of construction, so as to make the machinery as efficient as possible. * * * When the vessel is completed for the purpose intended, then the vessel is ‘built’ and not till then; whether it be a steamer, a sailing vessel, a barge, a scow, or a mere float designed to-support and transport a bhth house; * * * and whatever is supplied to such a vessel for the purpose of making it what it was intended to be, and' to enable it to enter upon the kind of business of navigation intended, is a part of the ‘building’ of the vessel. .This is the clear weight of authority.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. The Dredge A.