Blue Cross v. Commonwealth’s Empirical Analysis
1970
Citation profile
6 federal appellate · 2 district · 5 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 22 later decisions — most recently March 2011
6 federal appellate · 2 district · 5 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 United States v. Socony-Vacuum Oil Co. · Interstate Circuit, Inc. v. United States · Mandeville Island Farms, Inc. v. American Crystal Sugar Co. · United States v. Masonite Corp. · United States v. McKesson & Robbins, Inc.
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 22 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“Blue Cross is the creature of statutes enacted for the purpose of enabling hospitals and doctors to operate plans, administered by a corporate agent, offering prepaid hospital and medical services to subscribers. The subscribers are thereby benefited by receiving relief from the overwhelming expense incident to catastrophic illness. Participating hospitals and doctors benefit from assured payment for services rendered to many persons of modest resources who might otherwise be unable to pay. The worthy purposes of Blue Cross have received legislative approval and, indeed, Blue Cross enjoys a unique preference in the form of tax immunity. While recognizing that Blue Cross was not created for the purpose of acting as an insurance company, the Legislature was bound to see that it would directly compete with such taxpaying companies selling hospitalization and medical insurance. Viewed against this background the authority of Blue Cross to expand its activities, depending entirely upon statute, must be strictly construed.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the concurrence“The Blue Cross participating hospitals determined to inaugurate a plan for the furnishing of drugs to the subscriber-public. To implement the plan, they chose to act in concert through Blue Cross as their agent in setting the price at which they would deal with the sellers of drugs (the cooperating pharmacists). The Commission found that sellers of drugs knew they would lose business if they agreed to sell at the price set by Blue Cross.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority“Medical and Surgical Plans. — A group of physicians may conduct directly or through an agent, who may be either an individual or nonstock corporation, a plan or plans for furnishing prepaid medical or surgical or similar or related services or both.”
1 later decision 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.