Leland v. Oregon’s Empirical Analysis
1952
Citation profile
649 federal appellate · 58 district · 858 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 1,984 later decisions (111 by the Supreme Court) — most recently June 2025 · most notably Jackson v. Virginia (1979), Apprendi v. New Jersey (2000)
649 federal appellate · 58 district · 858 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
Applies 28 U.S.C. § 1257
Relies on Morissette v. United States · Snyder v. Commonwealth of Massachusetts · Palko v. State of Connecticut · United States v. Dotterweich
Cited together with In the Matter of Samuel Winship · Patterson v. New York · Mullaney v. Wilbur · Davis v. United States · Rivera v. Delaware
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 1,984 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“it offends some principle of justice so rooted in the traditions and conscience of our people as to be ranked as fundamental.”
27 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Schall v. Martin · Stump v. Bennett““Knowledge of right and wrong is the exclusive test of criminal responsibility in a majority of American jurisdictions. The science of psychiatry has made tremendous strides since that test was laid down in M’Naghten’s Case, but the progress of science has not reached a point where its learning would compel us to require the states to eliminate the right and wrong test from their criminal law. Moreover, choice of a test of legal sanity involves not only scientific knowledge but questions of basic policy as to the extent to which that knowledge should determine criminal responsibility.” [Emphasis supplied.] 2”
19 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the concurrence“required to prove beyond a reasonable doubt every element of the crime charged.”
10 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.