Burns v. United States’s Empirical Analysis
287 U.S. 216 · 1932
Citation profile
628 federal appellate · 48 district · 337 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 1,261 later decisions (31 by the Supreme Court) — most recently September 2025 · most notably Williams v. People of State of New York (1949), Berman v. United States (1937)
628 federal appellate · 48 district · 337 state decisions — followed in 42 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
reviewedBurns v. United States (from Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals)
Relationships
Relies on Langnes v. Green · United States v. Murray · The Steamship Styria v. James L Morgan · People Ex Rel. Forsyth v. . Court of Sessions
Cited together with Escoe v. Zerbst · Morrissey v. Brewer · Gagnon v. Scarpelli · Roberts v. United States · United States v. Murray
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 1,261 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“implies conscientious judgment, not arbitrary action.”
63 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.