Abrams v. United States’s Empirical Analysis
250 U.S. 616 · 1919
Citation profile
553 federal appellate · 79 district · 147 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 1,174 later decisions (200 by the Supreme Court) — most recently March 2026 · most notably New York Times Co. v. Sullivan (1964), Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc. (1974)
553 federal appellate · 79 district · 147 state decisions — followed in 33 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 Swift Company v. United States · Schenck v. United States · Frohwerk v. United States · Claassen v. United States
Cited together with New York Times Co. v. Sullivan · Whitney v. People of State of California · Schenck v. United States · Chaplinsky v. State of New Hampshire · Gitlow v. People of the State of New York
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 1,174 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“the best test of truth is the power of the thought to get itself accepted in the competition of the market . . . .”
33 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“But as against dangers peculiar to war, as against others, the principle of the right to free speech is always the same. It is only the present danger of immediate evil or an intent to bring it about that warrants Congress in setting a limit to the expression of opinion where private rights are not concerned. Congress certainly cannot forbid all effort to change the mind of the country. ... Only the emergency that makes it immediately dangerous to leave the correction of evil counsels to time warrants making any exception to the sweeping command. 'Congress shall make no law ... abridging the freedom of speech.' " It is urged that from the record it appears that picketing was done which barred ingress and egress to and from Ramser's place of business and that compulsion was exerted on common carriers to violate their lawful duty as such carriers to accept goods for transportation, which acts constitute unlawful picketing and unlawful purpose or object respectively, but the restraining order and judgment of contempt are clearly predicated upon a violation of the "hot cargo act”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. In Re Blaney · Greer v. Spock“I do not doubt for a moment that by the same reasoning that would justify punishing persuasion to murder, the United States constitutionally may punish speech that produces or is intended to produce a clear and imminent danger that it will bring about forthwith certain substantive evils that the United States constitutionally may seek to prevent. The power undoubtedly is greater in time of war than in time of peace because war opens dangers that do not exist at other times.”
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.