Higgs v. Carver’s Empirical Analysis
286 F.3d 437 · 2002
Citation profile
33 federal appellate · 3 district · 3 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 132 later decisions — most recently February 2020 · most notably Randall v. Scott (2010), Walker v. Thompson (2002)
33 federal appellate · 3 district · 3 state decisions
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 Bell v. Wolfish · Swierkiewicz v. Sorema N. A. · Leatherman v. Tarrant County Narcotics Intelligence and Coordination Unit · Beanstalk Group, Inc. v. AM General Corp.
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 132 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“[a]ll that need be specified is the bare minimum facts necessary to put the defendant on notice of the claim so he can file an answer.”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“special pleading rules for prisoner civil rights cases,”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Randall v. Scott · EPA v. Hernandez“All that need be specified is the bare minimum facts necessary to put the defendant on notice of the claim so that he can file an answer.... All that’s required to state a claim in a complaint filed in a federal court is a short statement, in plain (that is, ordinary, non-legalistic) English, of the legal claim .... The courts keep reminding plaintiffs that they don’t have to file long complaints, don’t have to plead facts, don’t have to plead legal theories.... Had Higgs merely alleged that the defendants had retaliated against him for filing a suit, without identifying the suit or the act or acts claimed to have constituted retaliation, the complaint would be insufficient ... because the defendant would not have known how to respond. But Higgs specified both the suit and the act of retaliation ..., and this specification was enough to enable the defendants to file an answer.”
1 later decision 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.