United States v. John’s Empirical Analysis
1978
Citation profile
176 federal appellate · 39 district · 99 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 394 later decisions (16 by the Supreme Court) — most recently June 2022 · most notably Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians v. Holyfield (1989), Oklahoma Tax Commission v. Citizen Band Potawatomi Indian Tribe of Oklahoma (1991)
176 federal appellate · 39 district · 99 state decisions — followed in 14 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
reviewedUnited States v. John (from Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals)
Relationships
Applies 18 U.S.C. § 1151 (Indian Crimes Act of 1976) · 18 U.S.C. § 1153 · 18 U.S.C. § 548 · 25 U.S.C. § 1301 (§ 201 of the Indian Civil Rights Act of 1968) · 25 U.S.C. § 476 · 25 U.S.C. § 478 · 25 U.S.C. § 479 · 28 U.S.C. § 1257
Relies on Patterson v. United States · United States v. Wheeler · Williams v. Lee · Keeble v. United States · McClanahan v. State Tax Commission of Arizona
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 394 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“[t]here is no apparent reason why these lands, which had been purchased in previous years for the aid of those Indians, did not become a 'reservation,' at least for the purposes of federal criminal jurisdiction, at that particular time.”
7 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“validly set apart for the use of the Indians as such, under the superintendence of the Government.”
7 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“Any Indian who commits against the person or property of another Indian or other person any of the following offenses, namely, murder, manslaughter, kidnapping, rape, carnal knowledge of any female, not his wife, who has not attained the age of sixteen years, assault with intent to commit rape, incest, assault with intent to commit murder, assault with a dangerous weapon, assault resulting in serious bodily injury, arson, burglary, robbery, and larceny within the Indian country, shall be subject to the same laws and penalties as all other persons committing any of the above offenses, within the exclusive jurisdiction of the United States.”
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.