Coleman v. Tennessee’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

53 federal appellate · 14 district · 27 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 211 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““But tlie section does not make the jurisdiction of the military tribunals exclusive of that of the state courts. It does not declare that soldiers committing the offenses named shall not he amenable to punishment by the state courts. It simply declares that the offenses shall be ‘punishable,’ not that they shall be punished by the military courts; and this is merely saying that they may be thus punished. Previous to its enactment the offenses designated were punishable by the state courts, and persons in the military service ■who committed them were delivered over to those courts for trial; and it contains no words indicating an intention on the part of Congress to take from them the jurisdiction in this respect which they had always exercised. With the known hostility of the American people to any interference by the military with the regular administration of justice in the civil courts, no such intention should be ascribed to Congress, in the absence of clear and direct language to that effect. We do not mean to intimate that it was not within the competency of Congress to confer exclusive jurisdiction upon military courts over offenses committed by persons in the military service of the United States. As Congress is expressly authorized by the Constitution ‘to raise and support armies’ and ‘to make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces,’ its control over the whole subject of the formation, organization, and government of the national armies”

   8 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. Caldwell v. Parker · Motherwell v. United States ex rel. Alexandroff

2. ““In time of war, insurrection, or rebellion, larceny, robbery, burglary, arson, mayhem, manslaughter, murder, assault and battery with an intent to kill, wounding, by shooting or stabbing with an intent to commit murder, * * * or assault and battery with an intent to commit rape, shall be punishable by the sentence of a general court-martial when committed by persons in the military service of the United States, and the punishment m any such case shall not be less than the punishment for the like offense by the laws of the State, Territory, or district in which such offense may have been committed.””

   3 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. Ex parte Mason · Ex parte King

3. ““The laws of Tennessee with regard to offenses and their punishment, which were allowed to remain in forcé during its military occupation, did not apply to the defendant, as he was at the time a soldier in the army of the United States, and subject to the articles of war. He was responsible for his conduct to the laws of his own government only, as enforced by the commander of its army in that state, without whose consent he could not even go beyond its lines. Had he been caught by the forces of the enemy, after committing the offense, he might have been subject to a summary trial and punishment by order of their commander; and there would have been no just ground of complaint, for the marauder and the assassin are not protected by any usages of civilized warfare. But the courts of the state, whose regular government was superseded, and whose laws were tolerated from motives of convenience, were without jurisdiction to deal with him.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. In re Ezeta