District of Columbia v. Bailey’s Empirical Analysis
171 U.S. 161 · 1898
Citation profile
23 federal appellate · 6 district · 24 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 71 later decisions (3 by the Supreme Court) — most recently August 2009 · most notably Piggly Wiggly Operators' Warehouse, Inc. v. Piggly Wiggly Operators' Warehouse Independent Truck Drivers Union, Local No. 1 (1980), United States v. Ellicott (1912)
23 federal appellate · 6 district · 24 state decisions — followed in 10 states
Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.
Appellate journey
reviewedthe decision below (from District of Columbia Circuit Court of Appeals)
Relationships
Relies on Metropolitan Co v. District of Columbia · District of Columbia v. Woodbury · Wood v. . Tunnicliff · Brady v. Mayor of Brooklyn
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 71 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“The necessary operation of these provisions of the statutes [of 1874 and 1878] is to cause the District commissioners to be merely administrative officers with ministerial powers only. The sum of the municipal powers of the District of Columbia are neither vested in nor exercised by the District commissioners. They are, on the contrary, vested in the Congress of the United States, acting pro hac vice as the legislative body of the District, and the commissioners of the District discharge the functions of administrative officials.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage“"It cannot be doubted that if the District commissioners themselves had seen fit to pass a resolution reciting that the appropriation by Congress for the improvement of the streets had been exhausted, and that a given sum of money was set aside to pay a claim for damages preferred against the District for having contracted when there was no appropriation, such action "would have been, under the statutes, vMra vires.””
1 later decision quote this exact passage
How this case has been treated — in progress
Whether each later court followed, distinguished, criticized, or overruled this decision. The treatment classification (task #35) runs highest-cited cases first and lights up here as it reaches this one.