Atlantic Cleaners & Dyers, Inc. v. United States’s Empirical Analysis
286 U.S. 427 · 1932
Citation profile
517 federal appellate · 85 district · 106 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 1,252 later decisions (128 by the Supreme Court) — most recently October 2025 · most notably Dewsnup v. Timm (1992), Home Building & Loan Ass'n v. Blaisdell (1934)
517 federal appellate · 85 district · 106 state decisions — followed in 26 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 & Co. v. United States · Capital Traction Co. v. Hof · Buttfield v. Stranahan · United States v. Hartwell
Cited together with Chevron U. S. A. Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc. · Helvering v. Stockholms Enskilda Bank · Apex Hosiery Co. v. Leader · Mandeville Island Farms, Inc. v. American Crystal Sugar Co. · United States v. South-Eastern Underwriters Ass'n
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 1,252 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“identical words used in different parts of the same act are intended to have the same meaning.”
72 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority““The argument for the claimant insists that ‘trade’ is here used in its most restrictive sense, and as equivalent to traffic in goods, or buying and selling in commerce or exchange. But I am clearly of opinion that such is not the true sense of the word, as used in the 32d section. In the first place, the word ‘trade’ is often, and indeed generally, used in a broader sense, as equivalent to occupation, employment, or business, whether manual or mercantile. Wherever any occupation, employment, or business is carried on for the purpose of profit, or gain, or a livelihood, not in the liberal arts or in the learned professions, it is constantly called a trade.””
9 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority““Most words have different shades of meaning and consequently may be variously construed, not only when they occur in different statutes, but when used more than once in the same statute or even in the same section. * * * Where the subject matter to which the words refer is not the same in the several places where they are used, or the conditions are different, * * * the meaning well may vary to meet the purposes of the law * * *. “It is not unusual for the same word to be used with different meanings in the same act, and there is no rule of statutory construction which precludes the courts from giving to the word the meaning which the Leg islature intended it should have in each instance.””
5 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.