Watson v. City of Memphis’s Empirical Analysis
1963
Citation profile
230 federal appellate · 37 district · 69 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 580 later decisions (71 by the Supreme Court) — most recently June 2025 · most notably Albemarle Paper Co. v. Moody (1975), Green v. County School Board of New Kent County (1968)
230 federal appellate · 37 district · 69 state decisions — followed in 18 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
reviewedWatson v. City of Memphis (from Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals)
Relationships
Relies on Brown et al. v. Board of Education of Topeka et al. · Brown v. Board of Education · Cooper v. Aaron · Smith v. Allwright · Buchanan v. Warley
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 580 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“[I]t is obvious that vindication of conceded constitutional rights cannot be made dependent upon any theory that it is less expensive to deny than to afford them.”
22 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“The rights here asserted are * * * present rights * * * and, unless there is an overwhelmingly compelling reason, they are to be promptly fulfilled.”
10 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“Given the extended time which has elapsed, it is far from clear that the mandate of the second Brown decision requiring that desegregation proceed with `all deliberate speed' would today be fully satisfied by types of plans or programs for desegregation of public educational facilities which eight years ago might have been deemed sufficient.”
3 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.