Baker v. Carr’s Empirical Analysis
1962
Citation profile
3,090 federal appellate · 1,814 district · 2,091 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 12,176 later decisions (471 by the Supreme Court) — most recently February 2026 · most notably Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife (1992), Warth v. Seldin (1975)
3,090 federal appellate · 1,814 district · 2,091 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
Applies 28 U.S.C. § 1343 · 28 U.S.C. § 2281 · 28 U.S.C. § 291 · 42 U.S.C. § 1971 (Civil Rights Act of 1957) · 42 U.S.C. § 1983 (Civil Rights Act of 1871 / Section 1983 (Ku Klux Klan Act)) · 7 U.S.C. § 291 (Capper-Volstead Act) · 7 U.S.C. § 601
Relies on Monroe v. Pape · Bell v. Hood · McGowan v. State of Maryland Gallagher · Williamson v. Lee Optical of Oklahoma, Inc.
Cited together with Flast v. Cohen · Warth v. Seldin · Association of Data Processing Service Organizations, Inc. v. Camp · Sierra Club v. Morton · Simon v. Eastern Kentucky Welfare Rights Organization
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 12,176 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“Prominent on the surface of any case held to involve a political question is found [1] a textually demonstrable constitutional commitment of the issue to a coordinate political department; or [2] a lack of judicially discoverable and manageable standards for resolving it; or [3] the impossibility of deciding without an initial policy determination of a kind clearly for nonjudicial discretion; or [4] the impossibility of a court’s undertaking independent resolution without expressing lack of the respect due coordinate branches of government; or [5] an unusual need for unquestioning adherence to a political decision already made; or [6] the potentiality of embarrassment from multifarious pronouncements by various departments on one question.”
1,030 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence.”
17 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the dissent““Every person who, under color of any statute, ordinance, regulation, custom, or usage, of any State or Territory, subjects, or causes to be subjected, any citizen of the United States or other person within the jurisdiction thereof to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured by the Constitution and laws, shall be liable to the party injured in an action at law, suit in equity, or other proper proceeding for redress.””
8 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the dissente.g. Rizzo v. Goode · Bell v. Hosse
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.