United States v. Murdock’s Empirical Analysis
290 U.S. 389 · 1933
Citation profile
1,000 federal appellate · 85 district · 226 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 1,724 later decisions (88 by the Supreme Court) — most recently September 2020 · most notably Screws v. United States (1945), Spies v. United States (1943)
1,000 federal appellate · 85 district · 226 state decisions — followed in 36 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
reviewedMurdock v. United States (from Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals)
Relationships
Relies on Quercia v. United States · Patton v. United States · Sinclair v. United States · United States Vajtauer v. Commissioner of Immigration at Port of New York
Cited together with Spies v. United States · United States v. Illinois Central Railroad · United States v. Bishop · Quercia v. United States · Morissette v. United States
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 1,724 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“[W]hen used in a criminal statute [willfully] generally means an act done with bad purpose; without justifiable excuse; stubbornly, obstinately, [or] perversely.... The word is also employed to characterize a thing done without ground for believing it lawful, or conduct marked by a careless disregard [of] whether or not one has the right so to act.”
33 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“Congress did not intend that a person, by reason of a bona fide misunderstanding as to his liability for the tax, as to his duty to make a return, or as to the adequacy of the records he maintained, should become a criminal by his mere failure to measure up to the prescribed standard of conduct.”
20 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“* * * A federal judge may analyze the evidence, comment upon it, and express his views with regard to the testimony of witnesses. He may advise the jury in respect of the facts, but the decision of issues of fact must be fairly left to the jury. Patton v. United States, 281 U.S. 276 , 288 [50 S.Ct. 253, 74 L.Ed. 854]; Quercia v. United States, 289 U.S. 466 [53 S.Ct. 698, 77 L.Ed. 1321]. Although the power of the judge to express an opinion as to the guilt of the defendant exists, it should be exercised cautiously and only in exceptional cases. * * *.”
8 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.