South Carolina v. Katzenbach’s Empirical Analysis
1966
Citation profile
456 federal appellate · 291 district · 132 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 1,743 later decisions (204 by the Supreme Court) — most recently April 2026 · most notably Adickes v. S. H. Kress & Co. (1970), Fitzpatrick v. Bitzer (1976)
456 federal appellate · 291 district · 132 state decisions — followed in 28 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. § 1391 · 28 U.S.C. § 1491 · 42 U.S.C. § 1971 (Civil Rights Act of 1957) · 42 U.S.C. § 1973 (§ 2 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965) · 42 U.S.C. § 1995
Relies on Brown et al. v. Board of Education of Topeka et al. · Griswold v. State of Connecticut · McGowan v. State of Maryland Gallagher · Williamson v. Lee Optical of Oklahoma, Inc. · M'Culloch v. State of Maryland
Cited together with Allen v. State Board of Elections · Katzenbach v. Morgan · Thornburg v. Gingles · City of Rome v. United States · Oregon v. Mitchell
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 1,743 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“No voting qualification or prerequisite to voting, or standard, practice, or procedure shall be imposed or applied by any State or political subdivision to deny or abridge the right of any citizen of the United States to vote on account of race or color.”
16 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“As against the reserved powers of the States, Congress may use any rational means to effectuate the constitutional prohibition of racial discrimination in voting.”
16 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“an insidious and pervasive evil which had been perpetuated in certain parts of our country through unremitting and ingenious defiance of the Constitution.”
16 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.