Whitcomb v. Chavis’s Empirical Analysis
1971
Citation profile
425 federal appellate · 131 district · 109 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 1,361 later decisions (127 by the Supreme Court) — most recently November 2021 · most notably Thornburg v. Gingles (1986), City of Mobile v. Bolden (1980)
425 federal appellate · 131 district · 109 state decisions — followed in 22 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 Baker v. Carr · Reynolds v. Sims · Gomillion v. Lightfoot · Wesberry v. Sanders · Allen v. State Board of Elections
Cited together with White v. Regester · Reynolds v. Sims · City of Mobile v. Bolden · Burns v. Richardson · Fortson v. Dorsey
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 1,361 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“its members had less opportunity than did other residents in the district to participate in the political processes and to elect legislators of their choice,”
29 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“not on population-based apportionment but on the quality of representation.”
16 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“violate the Fourteenth Amendment if 'conceived or operated as purposeful devices to further racial discrimination' by minimizing, cancelling out or diluting the voting strength of racial elements of the voting population.”
11 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.