Boos v. Barry’s Empirical Analysis
1988
Citation profile
600 federal appellate · 309 district · 359 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 2,024 later decisions (89 by the Supreme Court) — most recently May 2025 · most notably Ward v. Rock Against Racism (1989), Employment Division Department of Human Resources of Oregon v. L Smith (1990)
600 federal appellate · 309 district · 359 state decisions — followed in 31 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
reviewedFinzer v. Barry (from District of Columbia Circuit Court of Appeals)
Relationships
Applies 18 U.S.C. § 112
Relies on New York Times Co. v. Sullivan · Connick v. Myers · Grayned v. City of Rockford · United States v. O'Brien · Hoffman Estates v. Flipside, Hoffman Estates, Inc.
Cited together with Ward v. Rock Against Racism · Perry Education Ass'n v. Perry Local Educators' Ass'n · Clark v. Community for Creative Non-Violence · City of Renton v. Playtime Theatres, Inc. · Members of the City Council of Los Angeles v. Taxpayers for Vincent
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 2,024 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“our international law obligation to shield diplomats from speech that offends their dignity”
26 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“must be subjected to the most exacting scrutiny.”
25 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“are justified without reference to the content of the regulated speech”
15 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.