Townsend v. Burke’s Empirical Analysis
334 U.S. 736 · 1948
Citation profile
1,639 federal appellate · 96 district · 863 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 3,427 later decisions (67 by the Supreme Court) — most recently March 2026 · most notably Williams v. People of State of New York (1949), United States v. Tucker (1972)
1,639 federal appellate · 96 district · 863 state decisions — followed in 48 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 McNabb v. United States · Betts v. Brady · Haley v. Ohio · Bute v. People of State of Illinois
Cited together with Williams v. People of State of New York · United States v. Tucker · Gideon v. Wainwright · Mempa v. Rhay · Dorszynski 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 3,427 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“It is not the duration or severity of this sentence that renders it constitutionally invalid; it is the careless or designed pronouncement of sentence on a foundation so extensively and materially false, which the prisoner had no opportunity to correct by the services which counsel would provide, that renders the proceedings lacking in due process.”
80 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“the disadvantage from absence of counsel, when aggravated by circumstances showing that it resulted in the prisoner actually being taken advantage of, or prejudiced, does make out a case of violation of due process.”
4 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“Hence, lawfulness of the detention is not a factor in determining admissibility of any confession and if he were temporarily detained illegally it would have no bearing on the validity of his present confinement based on his plea of guilty, particularly since he makes no allegation that it induced the plea.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Roberts v. State
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.