Barclay v. Florida’s Empirical Analysis
1983
Citation profile
333 federal appellate · 40 district · 412 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 1,153 later decisions (77 by the Supreme Court) — most recently March 2026 · most notably Strickland v. Washington (1984), Wainwright v. Witt (1985)
333 federal appellate · 40 district · 412 state decisions — followed in 33 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 Gregg v. Georgia · Furman v. Georgia · Lockett v. Ohio · Engle v. Isaac · Eddings v. Oklahoma
Cited together with Zant v. Stephens · Lockett v. Ohio · Gregg v. Georgia · Strickland v. Washington · Proffitt v. Florida
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 1,153 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“[w]hat is important ... is an individualized determination on the basis of the character of the individual and the circumstances of the crime.”
44 later decisions quote this exact passage“the Constitution does not prohibit consideration at the sentencing phase of information not directly related to either statutory aggravating or statutory mitigating factors, as long as that information is relevant to the character of the defendant or the circumstances of the crime”
19 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the concurrence“[t]here is no reason why the Florida Supreme Court cannot examine the balance struck by the trial judge and decide that the elimination of improperly considered aggravating circumstances could not possibly affect the balance.”
12 later decisions quote this exact passagee.g. Fox v. Coyle · King v. State
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.