Harlan v. McGourin’s Empirical Analysis
218 U.S. 442 · 1910
Citation profile
158 federal appellate · 36 district · 55 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 372 later decisions (42 by the Supreme Court) — most recently April 2022 · most notably Johnson v. Zerbst (1938), Fay v. Noia (1963)
158 federal appellate · 36 district · 55 state decisions — followed in 18 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.
Relationships
Relies on Ex parte Lange · Bain Jr · Ex Parte Nielsen · Terry · Davis v. Beason
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 372 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““The attack is thus not upon the jurisdiction and authority of the court (below) to proceed to investigate and determine the truth of the charge, but upon the sufficiency of the evidence to show the guilt of the accused. This has never been held to be within the province of a writ of habeas corpus. Upon habeas corpus the court examines only the power and authority of the court to act, not the correctness of its conclusions.””
6 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority““It is .the settled doctrine of this court, often affirmed, that the writ of habeas corpus cannot be used for the purpose of proceedings in error, and that the jurisdiction under that writ is confined to an examination of the record, with a view to determining whether the person restrained of his liberty is detained without authority of law,” and “where collateral attacks have been sustained through the medium of a writ of habeas corpus, the grounds were such as attacked the validity of the judgments, and the objections sustained were such as rendered the judgment not merely erroneous, but void,” and “upon habeas corpus the court examines only the power and authority of the court to act, not the correctness of its conclusions.””
4 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority““The writ of habeas corpus cannot be made to perform the office of a writ of error.””
2 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.