Wilkerson v. McCarthy’s Empirical Analysis
336 U.S. 53 · 1949
Citation profile
680 federal appellate · 22 district · 300 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 1,200 later decisions (57 by the Supreme Court) — most recently May 2025 · most notably Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc. (1986), The Boeing Company v. Daniel C. Shipman (1969)
680 federal appellate · 22 district · 300 state decisions — followed in 29 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
Applies 45 U.S.C. § 54 (Federal Employers' Liability Act)
Relies on Lavender v. Kurn · Tennant v. Peoria & Pekin Union Railway Co. · Brady v. Southern Railway Co. · Tiller v. Atlantic Coast Line Railroad · Bailey v. Central Vermont Railway, Inc.
Cited together with Lavender v. Kurn · Tiller v. Atlantic Coast Line Railroad · Tennant v. Peoria & Pekin Union Railway Co. · Bailey v. Central Vermont Railway, Inc. · Rogers v. Missouri Pacific Railroad
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 1,200 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“* * * for the Act did not make the employer an insurer,”
14 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the concurrence“* * * And peremptory instructions should not be given in negligence cases `where the facts are in dispute, and the evidence in relation to them is that from which fair-minded men may draw different inferences.' Washington & G. R. Co. v. McDade, 135 U.S. 554 , 572, 10 S.Ct. 1044, 1049, 34 L.Ed. 235. Such has ever since been the established rule for trial and appellate courts. See Tiller v. Atlantic C. L. R. Co., 318 U.S. 54 , 67, 68, 63 S.Ct., 444, 451, 452, 87 L.Ed. 610.”
13 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“A timid judge, like a biased judge, is intrinsically a lawless judge.”
11 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.