  Candidate factors are not restricted to what institutions said; nor are they restricted to what settled legal opinion considers relevant. Perhaps the court said that the fact that the damage was caused by Doe’s carelessness was what made him liable to pay compensation. But the court might not have said so—it might have mentioned something else, or said some conflicting things. Or it might have mentioned carelessness and damage, but might have failed to say whether the magnitude and likelihood of the damage compared to the burden of precaution were germane to the standard of care that Doe failed. Would the fact that the court failed to mention these considerations rule out their relevance to future cases? The answer would depend on some further principles that explained why and how past decisions as a kind are relevant, if they are, to instant cases. If courts should respect their past decisions because doing so reduces uncertainty or mitigates other costs of economic transactions, a principle that the court failed to articulate might be irrelevant to the bearing of a case on future cases. But if courts’ responsibility is to engage with their past decisions because they must act with integrity, such principles may be decisive (Hershovitz 2006b).