United States v. George Macdaniel’s Empirical Analysis
32 U.S. 1 · 1833
Citation profile
50 federal appellate · 12 district · 26 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 161 later decisions (25 by the Supreme Court) — most recently March 2019 · most notably Barr v. Matteo (1959), Bull v. United States (1935)
50 federal appellate · 12 district · 26 state decisions — followed in 11 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. Moore · United States v. Tench Ringgold · Charles Gratiot v. The United States · Watkins 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 161 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““A practical knowledge of the action of any one of the great departments of the government must convince every person that file head of a department, in the distribution of its duties and responsibilities, is often compelled to exercise his discretion. He is limited in the exercise of his powers by the law; but it does not follow that he- must show statutory provision for everything he does. Xo government could be administered on such principles. To attempt to regulate by law the minute movements of every part of the complicated machinery of government would evince a most unpardonable ignorance on the subject. Whilst the great outlines of its movements may be marked out, and limitations imposed on the exercise of its powers there are numberless things which must be done, that can neither be anticipated nor defined, and which are essential to the proper action of the government.””
11 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority““There may be eases in which, the services having been rendered, a compensation may be made within the discretion of the head of the department; and in that, case the court and jury will do, not what an auditor was authorized to do, but what the head of the department should have done in sanctioning an equitable allowance.””
1 later decision 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.