Mitchell v. Flintkote Co.’s Empirical Analysis
185 F.2d 1008 · 1951
Citation profile
19 federal appellate · 4 district · 7 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 42 later decisions — most recently March 1999 · most notably United States v. Webber (1968), Kribbs v. JACKSON (1957)
19 federal appellate · 4 district · 7 state decisions
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.
Relationships
Relies on Erie Co v. Tompkins · United States v. Trans-Missouri Freight Ass'n · Sola Electric Co. v. Jefferson Electric Co. · Oscanyan v. Arms Co. · Trist v. Child
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 42 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““ * * * An agent who is hired to ensure that his employer is given an opportunity to bid is just as much an instrument in ‘securing’ the contract which results from an accepted bid as one who is hired to bring an employer’s offer to fruition through personal solicitation. Where, as in the present case, the board which prepared specifications also reported the defendant’s name to purchasing agencies as an available source of supply, it can hardly be said that the plaintiff, assuming that he performed under the contract, did not aid the company ‘to secure’ the contract within the meaning of Order No. 9001. The proscription of contingent fee contracts was intended to protect government agencies against corrupting influences, and competitive bidding does not completely safeguard this purpose. The lowest bid is not always taken, since administrative officials have some discretion in passing on the quality of the goods tendered, as well as on the ability of the bidder to perform. Hence bidding does not ensure that improper influence will not be brought to bear on the officials who have the responsibility of accepting or rejecting the bids. As Mr. Justice Holmes pointed out in Hazelton v. Sheckells, 202 U.S. 71, 79 , 26 S.Ct. 567 , 50 L.Ed. 939 , it is the tendency to corruption, not what was done in the particular case, which justifies the rule. “Executive Order No. 9001 is rigorous in its requirements. The Order flatly requires that no person be employed on contingent fee ‘to soli”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
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.