Evitts v. Lucey’s Empirical Analysis
1985
Citation profile
952 federal appellate · 128 district · 1,701 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 4,060 later decisions (73 by the Supreme Court) — most recently December 2025 · most notably Penson v. Ohio (1988), Coleman v. Thompson (1991)
952 federal appellate · 128 district · 1,701 state decisions — followed in 49 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
reviewedLucey v. Kavanaugh (from Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals)
Relationships
Relies on Strickland v. Washington · Anders v. California · Johnson v. Zerbst · Morrissey v. Brewer · Gideon v. Wainwright
Cited together with Strickland v. Washington · Coleman v. Thompson · Douglas v. People of State of California · Jones v. Barnes · Griffin v. People of the State of Illinois
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 4,060 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“a party whose counsel is unable to provide effective representation is in no better position than one who has no counsel at all.”
128 later decisions quote this exact passage“when a State opts to act in a field where its action has significant discretionary elements, it must nonetheless act in accord with the dictates of the Constitution--and, in particular, in accord with the Due Process Clause.”
14 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the concurrence“The right to appeal would be unique among state actions if it could be withdrawn without consideration of applicable due process norms.”
6 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.