United States v. Miller’s Empirical Analysis
307 U.S. 174 · 1939
Citation profile
304 federal appellate · 78 district · 219 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 857 later decisions (20 by the Supreme Court) — most recently July 2025 · most notably Adams v. Williams (1972), District of Columbia v. Heller (2008)
304 federal appellate · 78 district · 219 state decisions — followed in 33 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 United States v. Jin Fuey Moy · Robertson v. Baldwin · Sonzinsky v. United States · Presser v. State of 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 857 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“In the absence of any evidence tending to show that possession or use of a “shotgun having a barrel of less than eighteen inches in length” at this time has some reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia, we cannot say that the Second Amendment guarantees the right to keep and bear such an instrument. Certainly it is not within judicial notice that this weapon is any part of the ordinary military equipment or that its use could contribute to the common defense.”
52 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”
13 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“The General Court of Massachusetts, January Session 1784 (Laws and Resolves 1784, c. 55, pp. 140, 142), provided for the organization and government of the Militia. It directed that the Train Band should 'contain all able bodied men, from sixteen to forty years of age, and the Alarm List, all other men under sixty years of age, * * *.'”
2 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.