Cooke v. United States’s Empirical Analysis
267 U.S. 517 · 1925
Citation profile
474 federal appellate · 39 district · 752 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 1,683 later decisions (116 by the Supreme Court) — most recently June 2025 · most notably Bell v. Wolfish (1979), Powell v. State of Alabama Patterson (1932)
474 federal appellate · 39 district · 752 state decisions — followed in 45 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.
Appellate journey
reviewedthe decision below (from Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals)
Relationships
Relies on Gompers v. Bucks Stove & Range Co. · Terry · Hovey v. Elliott · Windsor v. McVeigh
Cited together with In re Oliver · Terry · Offutt v. United States · Sacher v. United States · Bloom v. Illinois
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 1,683 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“Due process of law, therefore, in the prosecution of contempt, except of that committed in open court, requires that the accused should be advised of the charges and have a reasonable opportunity to meet them by way of defense or explanation. We think this includes the assistance of counsel, if requested, and the right to call witnesses to give testimony, relevant either to the issue of complete exculpation or in extenuation of the offense and in mitigation of the penalty to be imposed.”
83 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“The power of contempt which a judge must have and exercise in protecting the due and orderly administration of justice and in maintaining the authority and dignity of the court is most important and indispensable. But its exercise is a delicate one and care is needed to avoid arbitrary or oppressive conclusions.”
31 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority““Power of court “A court of the United States shall have power to punish by fine or imprisonment, at its discretion, such contempt of its authority, and none other, as— “(1) Misbehavior of any person in its presence or so near thereto as to obstruct the administration of justice; “(2) Misbehavior of any of its officers in their official transactions; “(3) Disobedience or resistance to its lawful writ, process, order, rule, decree, or command. June 25, 1948, c. 645, 62 Stat. 701 .” “§ 402. Contempts constituting crimes “Any person, corporation or association willfully disobeying any lawful writ, process, order, rule, decree, or command of any district court of the United States or any court of the District of Columbia, by doing any act or thing therein, or thereby forbidden, if the act or thing so done be of such character as to constitute also a criminal offense under any statute of the United States or under the laws of any State in which the act was committed, shall be prosecuted for such contempt as provided in section 3691 of this title and shall be punished by fine or imprisonment, or both. * * * * “This section shall not be construed to relate to contempts committed in the presence of the court, or so near thereto as to obstruct the administration of justice, nor to contempts committed in disobedience of any lawful writ, process, order, rule, decree, or command entered in any suit or action brought or prosecuted in the name of, or on behalf of, the United States, but th”
4 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.