Light v. United States’s Empirical Analysis
220 U.S. 523 · 1911
Citation profile
130 federal appellate · 73 district · 83 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 432 later decisions (51 by the Supreme Court) — most recently May 2019 · most notably Ashwander v. Tennessee Valley Authority (1936), Massachusetts v. Mellon (1923)
130 federal appellate · 73 district · 83 state decisions — followed in 20 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 Pennoyer v. Neff · Shively v. Bowlby · United States v. Grimaud · Siler v. Louisville & Nashville Railroad · Fort Leavenworth Co v. Lowe
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 432 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“* * * And so, without passing a statute, or taking any affirmative action on the subject, the United States suffered its public domain, to be used for such purposes. There thus grew up a sort of implied license that these lands, thus left open, might be used so long as the Government did not cancel its tacit consent.”
8 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“Congress shall have Power to dispose of and make all needful Rules and Regulations respecting the Territory or other Property belonging to the United States.”
5 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“The Secretary of Agriculture shall make provisions for the protection against destruction by fire and depredations upon the public forests and national forests which may have been set aside or which may be hereafter set aside under the provisions of section 471 of this title, and which may be continued; and he may make such rules and regulations and establish such service as will insure the objects of such reservations, namely, to regulate their occupancy and use and to preserve the forests thereon from de struction; * * *. [Emphasis supplied.]”
3 later decisions 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.