Most Important Torts Cases to Know

Torts is a common-law course, so your professor's casebook is the syllabus. But the doctrinal skeleton is national, and a small set of cases supplies it. If you can state the holding and the operative facts of the cases below, you can write a competent answer to almost any 1L Torts issue.

Use a two-line format for each: (1) the rule the case stands for, (2) the fact hook that lets you analogize. "Substantial certainty intent, Garratt v. Dailey, five-year-old pulls chair" is enough. Full case briefs are for class; two-line entries are for the exam.

On the exam itself, most professors want the rule, not the citation. Cite by short case name in the text — "under Carroll Towing, B < PL" — and move on. Save full Bluebook form for your legal writing memo, where a case citation looks like Palsgraf v. Long Island R.R. Co., 162 N.E. 99 (N.Y. 1928) under Rule 10.4 (court identified in the parenthetical because the regional reporter does not reveal it), or with the parallel official cite in law-review format: Palsgraf v. Long Island R.R. Co., 248 N.Y. 339, 162 N.E. 99 (1928).

Intent is the whole game in the first unit. Garratt v. Dailey, 279 P.2d 1091 (Wash. 1955), is the anchor: intent is satisfied by purpose or by knowledge to a substantial certainty that the contact will result. The five-year-old defendant matters because it shows minors can form tortious intent. Vosburg v. Putney, 50 N.W. 403 (Wis. 1891), gives you the unlawful-touching rule plus the eggshell-plaintiff damages principle — the kick in the schoolroom, tiny in itself, produced a ruined leg. Talmage v. Smith, 59 N.W. 656 (Mich. 1894), supplies transferred intent when the thrown stick hits the wrong boy.

For emotional distress, Wilkinson v. Downton, [1897] 2 Q.B. 57, is the historical origin, and Womack v. Eldridge, 210 S.E.2d 145 (Va. 1974), states the modern four-element IIED test. Then learn the constitutional ceiling: Hustler Magazine, Inc. v. Falwell, 485 U.S. 46 (1988), and Snyder v. Phelps, 562 U.S. 443 (2011), both hold that the First Amendment bars IIED recovery for speech on matters of public concern, however outrageous.

Privileges are heavily tested because they generate clean fact patterns. Katko v. Briney, 183 N.W.2d 657 (Iowa 1971), holds you may not use deadly force — a spring gun — to protect unoccupied property. Ploof v. Putnam, 71 A. 188 (Vt. 1908), and Vincent v. Lake Erie Transportation Co., 124 N.W. 221 (Minn. 1910), are a pair: private necessity privileges the entry, but the actor pays for actual damage caused. Surocco v. Geary, 3 Cal. 69 (1853), is the contrast — public necessity is a complete defense with no compensation.

Brown v. Kendall, 60 Mass. (6 Cush.) 292 (1850), moved American law from trespass writs to fault and put the burden of proving negligence on the plaintiff. Vaughan v. Menlove, 132 Eng. Rep. 490 (C.P. 1837), establishes the objective reasonable-person standard — the defendant's honest stupidity about his hayrick was no defense.

For breach, United States v. Carroll Towing Co., 159 F.2d 169 (2d Cir. 1947), gives you Judge Hand's B < PL formula, and it is the single most useful analytical tool on a breach question. Pair it with Adams v. Bullock, 125 N.E. 93 (N.Y. 1919), where Cardozo found no breach because the risk from the trolley wire was extraordinary and unforeseeable — the low-probability side of the same equation.

Custom is a recurring trap. The T.J. Hooper, 60 F.2d 737 (2d Cir. 1932), holds that industry custom is evidence but never conclusive: a whole calling may lag in adopting available precautions (radio receivers on tugboats). Trimarco v. Klein, 436 N.E.2d 502 (N.Y. 1982), shows the mirror image — custom is admissible and probative on both breach and reasonableness.

For statutory standards, Martin v. Herzog, 126 N.E. 814 (N.Y. 1920), makes unexcused violation of a safety statute negligence per se in New York, and Tedla v. Ellman, 19 N.E.2d 987 (N.Y. 1939), carves out the excuse when compliance would be more dangerous. Special-capacity cases worth a line each: Breunig v. American Family Insurance Co., 173 N.W.2d 619 (Wis. 1970) (sudden, unforeseeable mental incapacity can excuse), and Roberts v. State, 396 So. 2d 566 (La. Ct. App. 1981) (a blind defendant is held to the standard of a reasonable blind person).

Byrne v. Boadle, 159 Eng. Rep. 299 (Ex. 1863), is res ipsa loquitur — the barrel of flour out the window. Ybarra v. Spangard, 154 P.2d 687 (Cal. 1944), extends it to an unconscious patient and multiple medical defendants. Summers v. Tice, 199 P.2d 1 (Cal. 1948), shifts the burden to two negligent hunters when only one bullet hit the plaintiff (alternative liability), and Sindell v. Abbott Laboratories, 607 P.2d 924 (Cal. 1980), builds market-share liability for DES on the same intuition.

For multiple sufficient causes, Kingston v. Chicago & Northwestern Railway Co., 211 N.W. 913 (Wis. 1927), gives you the two-fires substantial-factor rule. Zuchowicz v. United States, 140 F.3d 381 (2d Cir. 1998), is Judge Calabresi's treatment of causal inference where the negligent aspect (an overdose) is the very thing likely to produce the harm.

Palsgraf v. Long Island Railroad Co., 162 N.E. 99 (N.Y. 1928), is the most-tested case in the course. Know both opinions: Cardozo frames it as duty — no duty runs to an unforeseeable plaintiff outside the orbit of risk — while Andrews, dissenting, frames it as proximate cause with a multi-factor test. Whichever framework your professor prefers, discuss both. Then compare Overseas Tankship (U.K.) Ltd. v. Morts Dock & Engineering Co. (The Wagon Mound (No. 1)), [1961] A.C. 388 (P.C.), requiring foreseeability of the type of harm, against In re Polemis, [1921] 3 K.B. 560, and its rejected directness test.

Two doctrines that reliably appear as sub-issues: the eggshell-skull rule, well stated in Benn v. Thomas, 512 N.W.2d 537 (Iowa 1994), and the rescue doctrine from Wagner v. International Railway Co., 133 N.E. 437 (N.Y. 1921) — "danger invites rescue," so the rescuer is a foreseeable plaintiff.

MacPherson v. Buick Motor Co., 111 N.E. 1050 (N.Y. 1916), killed the privity requirement of Winterbottom v. Wright and is the hinge between contract and modern tort. It is worth knowing that MacPherson is a negligence case, not a strict liability case — students confuse it with Greenman constantly.

For affirmative duties, contrast Harper v. Herman, 499 N.W.2d 472 (Minn. 1993) (no general duty to rescue; boat owner owed no duty to a guest who dove into shallow water) with Farwell v. Keaton, 240 N.W.2d 217 (Mich. 1976) (companions on a social venture assume a duty). Tarasoff v. Regents of the University of California, 551 P.2d 334 (Cal. 1976), imposes a therapist's duty to use reasonable care to protect an identifiable third party from a patient's threats.

Landowner duty splits by jurisdiction, which is exactly the kind of variation professors test. Rowland v. Christian, 443 P.2d 561 (Cal. 1968), abolished the invitee/licensee/trespasser categories in favor of ordinary reasonable care; a large minority of states still use the traditional categories, illustrated by Carter v. Kinney, 896 S.W.2d 926 (Mo. 1995). Many states now merge invitees and licensees but keep a reduced duty to trespassers. Say which approach you are applying before you apply it.

For third-party criminal acts, Kline v. 1500 Massachusetts Avenue Apartment Corp., 439 F.2d 477 (D.C. Cir. 1970), and Posecai v. Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., 752 So. 2d 762 (La. 1999), give you the competing foreseeability tests (prior similar incidents, totality of circumstances, and Posecai's balancing test). For NIED, Dillon v. Legg, 441 P.2d 912 (Cal. 1968), and its retrenchment in Thing v. La Chusa, 771 P.2d 814 (Cal. 1989), define the bystander rules; Falzone v. Busch, 214 A.2d 12 (N.J. 1965), is the zone-of-danger case.

Rylands v. Fletcher, (1868) L.R. 3 H.L. 330, is the origin of abnormally dangerous activity liability. Indiana Harbor Belt Railroad Co. v. American Cyanamid Co., 916 F.2d 1174 (7th Cir. 1990), is Judge Posner's modern application refusing to treat transporting acrylonitrile as abnormally dangerous because negligence liability was adequate.

Products liability runs through three California cases. Escola v. Coca Cola Bottling Co., 150 P.2d 436 (Cal. 1944), matters only for Justice Traynor's concurrence urging absolute liability. Greenman v. Yuba Power Products, Inc., 377 P.2d 897 (Cal. 1963), adopts it. Barker v. Lull Engineering Co., 573 P.2d 443 (Cal. 1978), sets the two-prong design defect test (consumer expectations or risk-utility with the burden on the defendant), and Soule v. General Motors Corp., 882 P.2d 298 (Cal. 1994), limits the consumer-expectations prong to cases within everyday experience. Note the competing framework: the Restatement (Third) of Torts: Products Liability § 2(b) requires a reasonable alternative design, which many states have adopted and others rejected.

Finish with damages and defenses. Li v. Yellow Cab Co., 532 P.2d 1226 (Cal. 1975), replaced contributory negligence (Butterfield v. Forrester, 103 Eng. Rep. 926 (K.B. 1809)) with pure comparative fault; most states use a modified 50% or 51% bar instead, usually by statute. Murphy v. Steeplechase Amusement Co., 166 N.E. 173 (N.Y. 1929) — "The Flopper" — is primary assumption of risk. Tunkl v. Regents of the University of California, 383 P.2d 441 (Cal. 1963), lists the factors invalidating exculpatory agreements. For punitive damages, BMW of North America, Inc. v. Gore, 517 U.S. 559 (1996), and State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Co. v. Campbell, 538 U.S. 408 (2003), impose due process limits, including Campbell's suggestion that single-digit ratios will usually satisfy due process.

Do not narrate facts. A sentence like "This is like Garratt v. Dailey because Dan knew with substantial certainty that Pam would sit where the chair had been" earns points; three sentences summarizing the Garratt facts earn none. Lead with the rule, apply it to the hypothetical facts, then name the case as support.

Where the law genuinely splits — landowner categories, design defect tests, comparative fault variants, IIED's outrageousness threshold, NIED bystander rules — say so explicitly and argue both. Professors write those splits into fact patterns on purpose, and identifying the split is usually worth more than picking the "right" side.

Finally, check your professor's own scholarship and any supplemental readings. If your casebook is Prosser-derived, the canon above will match closely; if your professor teaches from a law-and-economics or Restatement (Third) orientation, weight Carroll Towing, Indiana Harbor Belt, and the Restatement provisions more heavily and treat the older English cases as background.