Wainwright v. Witt’s Empirical Analysis
1985
Citation profile
1,107 federal appellate · 75 district · 4,314 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 6,697 later decisions (74 by the Supreme Court) — most recently December 2025 · most notably Miller-El v. Cockrell Director Texas Department of Criminal Justice Institutional Division (2003), Anderson v. City of Bessemer City (1985)
1,107 federal appellate · 75 district · 4,314 state decisions — followed in 46 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
reviewedthe decision below (from Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals)
Relationships
Relies on In the Matter of Samuel Winship · United States v. Leon · Wainwright v. Sykes · Townsend v. Sain · Gregg v. Georgia
Cited together with Witherspoon v. Illinois · Strickland v. Washington · Adams v. Texas · Batson v. Kentucky · Caldwell v. Mississippi
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 6,697 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“prevent or substantially impair the performance of his duties as a juror in accordance with his instructions and his oath.”
544 later decisions quote this exact passage“peculiarly within a trial judge's province.”
60 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the dissente.g. Hulsey v. Sargent · Byrd v. Wilson“nothing we say today bears upon the power of a State to execute a defendant sentenced to death by a jury from which the only veniremen who were in fact excluded for cause were those who made unmistakably clear (1) that they would automatically vote against the imposition of capital punishment without regard to any evidence that might be developed at the trial of the case before them, or (2) that their attitude toward the death penalty would prevent them from making an impartial decision as to the defendant's guilt.”
13 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the concurrence
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.