Morissette v. United States’s Empirical Analysis
1952
Citation profile
3,355 federal appellate · 210 district · 1,797 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 6,648 later decisions (189 by the Supreme Court) — most recently November 2025 · most notably Almendarez-Torres v. United States (1998), Taylor v. United States (1990)
3,355 federal appellate · 210 district · 1,797 state decisions — followed in 47 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.
Appellate journey
reviewedMorissette v. United States (from Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals)
Relationships
Applies 26 U.S.C. § 145
Relies on Williams v. People of State of New York · Screws v. United States · Spies v. United States · United States v. Dotterweich
Cited together with United States v. Balint · United States v. Dotterweich · Liparota v. United States · United States v. United States Gypsum Co. · United States v. Freed
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 6,648 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“The contention that an injury can amount to a crime only when inflicted by intention is no provincial or transient notion. It is as universal and persistent in mature systems of law as belief in freedom of the human will and a consequent ability and duty of the normal individual to choose between good and evil.”
330 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“But juries are not bound by what seems inescapable logic to judges.”
58 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“To steal means to take away from one in lawful possession without right with the intention to keep wrongfully.”
32 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.