Ritchie v. Donnelly’s Empirical Analysis
1991
Citation profile
20 district · 95 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 117 later decisions — most recently June 2019 · most notably Okwa v. Harper (2000), DiPino v. Davis (1999)
20 district · 95 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 42 U.S.C. § 1983 (Civil Rights Act of 1871 / Section 1983 (Ku Klux Klan Act))
Relies on Monell v. Department of Social Services of City of New York · Adickes v. S. H. Kress & Co. · Scheuer v. Rhodes · Ex Parte: Edward T Young · City of Canton v. Harris
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 117 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“Every person who, under color of any statute, ordinance, regulation, custom, or usage, of any State or Territory or the District of Columbia, subjects, or causes to be subjected, any citizen of the United States or other person within the jurisdiction thereof to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured by the Constitution and laws, shall be liable to the party injured in an action at law, suit in equity, or other proper proceeding for redress.”
6 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the concurrence““a public official who violates the plaintiffs rights under the Maryland Constitution is personally liable for compensatory damages.. This liability for damages resulting from unconstitutional acts is in no way based upon the ‘official/individual capacity’ body of law which had developed in federal § 1983 claims. Liability has been imposed upon the government official when his unconstitutional actions were in accordance with or dictated by governmental policy or custom. Liability also has been imposed when the unconstitutional acts were inconsistent with governmental policy or custom. Moreover, ... liability has been imposed upon the official when he was acting in the scope of his employment.””
5 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the concurrence““As a result of 1985 amendments to the Maryland Tort Claims Act, the statute does not exclude specified categories of torts except claims arising ‘from the combatant activities of the State Militia during a state of emergency/ § 5-399.2(a)(3) of the Courts and Judicial Proceedings Article. Otherwise, ‘tort actions generally1 are encompassed, Simpson v. Moore, 323 Md. 215, 219 , 592 A.2d 1090, 1092 (1991), as long as the state employee’s actions were not malicious, grossly negligent, or outside the scope of employment, Boyer v. State, supra, 323 Md. at 579, n. 14 , 594 A.2d at 131, n. 14; Sawyer v. Humphries, 322 Md. 247, 253 , 587 A.2d 467, 470 (1991). House Bill 364 of the 1989 Session of the General Assembly would have provided that ‘[ijmmunity is not waived’ under the Maryland Tort Claims Act for ‘any state ... constitutional claim.’ In the course of the bill’s legislative process, this provision was amended out. Ultimately House Bill 364 did not pass.””
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the concurrence
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.