Blackburn v. Alabama’s Empirical Analysis
1960
Citation profile
571 federal appellate · 108 district · 1,085 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 2,222 later decisions (101 by the Supreme Court) — most recently May 2025 · most notably Jackson v. Virginia (1979), Miranda v. State of Arizona Vignera (1966)
571 federal appellate · 108 district · 1,085 state decisions — followed in 49 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 Lisenba v. People of State of California · Spano v. People of the State of New York · Haley v. Ohio · Brown v. State of Mississippi
Cited together with Miranda v. State of Arizona Vignera · Townsend v. Sain · Jackson v. Denno · Culombe v. Connecticut · Haynes v. Washington
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 2,222 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“the product of a rational intellect and a free will.”
57 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“the blood of the accused is not the only hallmark of an unconstitutional inquisition.”
32 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“As important as it is that persons who have committed crimes be convicted, there are considerations which transcend the question of guilt or innocence. Thus, in cases involving involuntary confessions, this Court enforces the strongly felt attitude of our society that important human values are sacrificed where an agency of the government, in the course of securing a conviction, wrings a confession out of an accused against his will.”
31 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.