Bibb v. Navajo Freight Lines, Inc.’s Empirical Analysis
1959
Citation profile
164 federal appellate · 60 district · 199 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 731 later decisions (44 by the Supreme Court) — most recently March 2025 · most notably Florida Lime & Avocado Growers, Inc. v. Paul (1963), Goldblatt v. Town of Hempstead (1962)
164 federal appellate · 60 district · 199 state decisions — followed in 27 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 49 U.S.C. § 304
Relies on Williamson v. Lee Optical of Oklahoma, Inc. · Southern Pac Co v. State of Arizona Sullivan · SC Hwy. Dept. v. Barnwell Bros. · Sproles v. Binford · Public Utilities Commission of State of California 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 731 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“'the total effect of the law as a safety measure in reducing accidents and casualties is so slight or problematical as not to outweigh the national interest in keeping interstate commerce free from interferences which seriously impede it,'”
12 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“A State which insists on a design out of line with the requirements of almost all the other States may sometimes place a great burden of delay and inconvenience on those interstate motor carriers entering or crossing its territory. Such a new safety device-out of line with the requirements of the other States-may be so compelling that the innovating State need not be the one to give way. But the present showing-balanced against the clear burden on commerce-is far too inconclusive.”
4 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“(t)his is one of those cases-few in number-where local safety measures that are nondiscriminatory place an unconstitutional burden on interstate commerce.”
4 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.