Northwestern Laundry v. City of Des Moines’s Empirical Analysis
239 U.S. 486 · 1916
Citation profile
9 federal appellate · 76 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 109 later decisions (16 by the Supreme Court) — most recently December 2006 · most notably Louisville Gas & Electric Co. v. Coleman (1928), Miller v. Schoene (1928)
9 federal appellate · 76 state decisions — followed in 19 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 Yick Wo v. Hopkins · Hadacheck v. Sebastian · United States v. Tynen · Chicago Alton Railroad Company v. Henry a Tranbarger · Reinman v. City of Little Rock
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 109 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“As to the attack upon the ordinance because of arbitrary classification, this question has been so often discussed that nothing further need be said. The ordinance applies equally to all coming within its terms, and the fact that other businesses might have been included does not make such arbitrary classification as annuls the legislation. Nor does it make the classification illegal because certain cities are included and others omitted in the statute. Northwestern Laundry v. Des Moines, 239 U.S. 486, 495 , 36 S.Ct. 206, 210 , 60 L.Ed. 396 (1915). (Emphasis supplied.)”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“‘ ‘ So far as the Federal Constitution is concerned, we have no doubt the state may, by itself or through authorized municipalities, declare the emission of dense smoke in cities or populous neighborhoods a nuisance and subject to restraint as such; and that the harshness of such legislation, or its effect upon business interests, short of a merely arbitrary enactment, are not valid constitutional objections.. Nor is there any valid Federal constitutional objection in the fact that the regulation may require the discontinuance of the use of property, or subject the occupant to large expense in complying with the terms of the law or ordinance. ””
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Ballentine v. Nester
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.