Richardson v. Ramirez’s Empirical Analysis
1974
Citation profile
222 federal appellate · 36 district · 144 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 654 later decisions (42 by the Supreme Court) — most recently May 2025 · most notably Bell v. Wolfish (1979), City of Cleburne Texas v. Cleburne Living Center (1985)
222 federal appellate · 36 district · 144 state decisions — followed in 27 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 Edelman v. Jordan · Roe v. Wade · Flast v. Cohen · Reynolds v. Sims · Aetna Life Ins Co of Hartford Conn v. Haworth
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 654 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“Representatives shall be apportioned among the several States according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed. But when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice President of the United States, Representatives in Congress, the Executive and Judicial officers of a State, or the members of the Legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such State, being twenty-one years of age, and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion, or other crime, the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such State.”
17 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“the exclusion of felons from the vote has an affirmative sanction in section 2 of the Fourteenth Amendment, a sanction which was not present in the case of the other restrictions on the franchise which were invalidated [in other cases].”
8 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Hand v. Scott · Valenti v. Lawson“That when the people of any one of said rebel States shall have formed a constitution of government in conformity with the Constitution of the United States in all respects, framed by a convention of delegates elected by the male citizens of said State, twenty-one years old and upward, of whatever race, color, or previous condition, who have been resident in said State for one year previous to the day of such election, except such as may be disenfranchised for participation in the rebellion or for felony at common law ---- said State shall be declared entitled to representation in Congress, and senators and representatives shall be admitted therefrom on their taking the oath prescribed by law, and then and thereafter the preceding sections of this act shall be inoperative in said State.”
5 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.