Vance v. Universal Amusement Co.’s Empirical Analysis
1980
Citation profile
202 federal appellate · 37 district · 127 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 580 later decisions (29 by the Supreme Court) — most recently March 2026 · most notably Fw/pbs Inc II v. City of Dallas Mjr Inc (1990), Madsen v. Women's Health Center, Inc. (1994)
202 federal appellate · 37 district · 127 state decisions — followed in 20 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
reviewedUniversal Amusement Co. v. Vance (from Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals)
Relationships
Relies on Railroad Commission v. Pullman Co. · National Association for Advancement of Colored People v. Y Button · United States v. United Mine Workers of America · Miller v. California · Hague v. Committee for Industrial Organization
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.
“Any system of prior restraint * * * “comes to this Court bearing a heavy presumption against its constitutional validity.” * * * The presumption against prior restraints is heavier — and the degree of protection broader — than that against limits on expression imposed by criminal penalties. Behind the distinction is a theory deeply etched in our law: a free society prefers to punish the few who abuse rights of speech after they break the law than to throttle them and all others beforehand. It is always difficult to know in advance what an individual will say, and the line between legitimate and illegitimate speech is often so finely drawn that the risks of freewheeling censorship are formidable.”
13 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the dissent““As the District Court and the Court of Appeals construed Art. 4667(a), when coupled with the Texas Rules of Civil Procedure, it authorizes prior restraints of indefinite duration on the exhibition of motion pictures that have not been finally adjudicated to be obscene. Presumably, an exhibitor would be required to obey such an order pending review of its -merits and would be subject to contempt proceedings even if the film is ultimately found to be nonobscene. Such prior restraints would be more onerous and more objectionable than the threat of criminal sanctions after a film has been exhibited, since nonobscenity would be a defense to any criminal prosecution.” 445 U.S. at 316 , 63 L. Ed. 2d at 420-21 , 100 S. Ct. at 1161-62 .”
8 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“a heavy presumption against its constitutional validity.”
4 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.