Commonwealth v. Badger’s Empirical Analysis
1978
Citation profile
57 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 59 later decisions (2 by the Supreme Court) — most recently October 2025 · most notably Strickland v. Washington (1984), Commonwealth v. Pierce (1987)
57 state decisions
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 Chapman v. State of California · Harrington v. California · Holloway v. Arkansas · Schneble v. Florida · Commonwealth Ex Rel. Washington v. Maroney
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 59 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“Our task in cases of this nature therefore encompasses both an independent review of the record . . . and an examination of counsel's stewardship of the now challenged proceedings in light of the available alternatives. . . We cannot emphasize strongly enough, however, that our inquiry ceases and counsel's assistance is deemed constitutionally effective once we are able to conclude that the particular course chosen by counsel had some reasonable basis designed to effectuate his client's interests. The test is not whether other alternatives were more reasonable, employing a hindsight evaluation of the record . . . [T]he balance tips in favor of a finding of effective assistance as soon as it is determined that trial counsel's decisions had any reasonable basis.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“[I]n examining the alternatives, a court may not utilize a harmless error analysis, and the alternatives must be examined only as a means of determining whether the course chosen had some reasonable basis. 3”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“"... a finding of ineffectiveness [can] never be made unless [it can be] concluded that the alternatives not chosen offered a potential for success substantially greater than the tactics actually utilized.” Commonwealth ex rel. Washington v. Maroney, supra, 427 Pa. at 605, n. 8, 235 A.2d 353 , n. 8 ... the alternatives must be examined only as a means of determining whether the course chosen had some reasonable basis.”
1 later decision 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.