Sheets v. Knight’s Empirical Analysis
1989
Citation profile
12 federal appellate · 58 district · 40 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 122 later decisions — most recently October 2018 · most notably Hartbarger v. Frank Paxton Co. (1993), Wilder v. Cody Country Chamber of Commerce (1994)
12 federal appellate · 58 district · 40 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
Applies 29 U.S.C. § 141 (§ 1 of the Labor Management Relations Act of 1947 (Taft-Hartley Act)) · 42 U.S.C. § 2000E (§ 701 of the Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964)
Relies on McCullough Iron Co. v. Carpenter
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 122 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“"`[G]enerally an employer may discharge an employee at any time and for any reason, absent a contractual, statutory or constitutional requirement [to the contrary]. Termination of employment ordinarily does not create a tortious cause of action.'" 308 Or. at 230 [779 P.2d 1000] (quoting Patton v. J.C. Penney, 301 Or. 117, 120 , 719 P.2d 854 (1986)).”
4 later decisions quote this exact passage“"In dicta we twice suggested that the covenant might be implied in at-will contracts. See State ex rel Roberts v. Public Finance Co., 294 Or. 713 , 719 n. 4, 662 P.2d 330 (1983); Best v. U.S. Bank, 303 Or. 557, 564 , 739 P.2d 554 (1987). Although these cases referred to at-will employment, the dicta is better understood as dealing with situations in which the employee had developed a reasonable expectation of continued employment. Because at-will employees may be fired at any time and for any reason, they have no reasonable expectation of continued employment. Such a reasonable expectation is only present where the at-will contract has been supplanted by some other contractual relationship, like an implied-in-fact contract." 308 Or. at 234 n. 13, 779 P.2d 1000 .”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“is appropriate in matters pertaining to ongoing performance of at-will employment agreements.”
3 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.