Ford v. Wainwright’s Empirical Analysis
1986
Citation profile
834 federal appellate · 64 district · 752 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 2,370 later decisions (101 by the Supreme Court) — most recently November 2025 · most notably Teague v. Lane (1989), Murray v. Carrier (1986)
834 federal appellate · 64 district · 752 state decisions — followed in 37 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
Applies 28 U.S.C. § 2254 (Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996)
Relies on Strickland v. Washington · Mathews v. Eldridge · Morrissey v. Brewer · Cleveland Board of Education v. Loudermill · Townsend v. Sain
Cited together with Atkins v. Virginia · Strickland v. Washington · Penry v. Lynaugh · Gregg v. Georgia · Panetti v. Quarterman
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 2,370 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“we leave to the State[s] the task of developing appropriate ways to enforce the constitutional restriction upon its execution of sentences.”
45 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the dissent“I would hold that the Eighth Amendment forbids the execution only of those who are unaware of the punishment they are about to suffer and why they are to suffer it.”
24 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the concurrence“heightened procedural requirements on capital trials and sentencing proceedings”
21 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.