Mills v. Maryland’s Empirical Analysis
1988
Citation profile
569 federal appellate · 33 district · 985 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 2,085 later decisions (75 by the Supreme Court) — most recently June 2025 · most notably Payne v. Tennessee (1991), Boyde v. California (1990)
569 federal appellate · 33 district · 985 state decisions — followed in 36 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.
Relationships
Relies on Illinois v. Gates · Franks v. Delaware · Gregg v. Georgia · Lockett v. Ohio · Sandstrom v. Montana
Cited together with Strickland v. Washington · McKoy v. North Carolina · Lockett v. Ohio · Eddings v. Oklahoma · 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 2,085 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“a substantial probability that reasonable jurors ... well may have thought they were precluded from considering any mitigating evidence unless all 12 jurors agreed on the existence of a particular such circumstance.”
97 later decisions quote this exact passage“Based upon the evidence we unanimously find that each of the following mitigating circumstances which is marked `yes' has been proven to exist by a preponderance of the evidence. . . .”
12 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Ex Parte Martin · Howard v. Gittere“In determining which penalty is to be imposed on[each] defendant, you shall consider all of the evidence which has been received during any part of the trial of this case, [except as you may be hereafter instructed], You shall consider, take into account and be guided by the following factors, if applicable: (a) The circumstances of the crime of which the defendant was convicted in the present proceeding and the existence of any special circumstance[s] found to be true. (b) The presence or absence of criminal activity by the defendant which involved the use or attempted use of force or violence or the expressed or implied threat to use force or violence. (c) The presence or absence of any prior felony conviction. (d) Whether or not the offense was committed while the defendant was under the influence of extreme mental or emotional disturbance. (e) Whether or not the victim was a participant in the defendant's homicidal conduct or consented to the homicidal act. (f) Whether or not the offense was committed under circumstances which the defendant reasonably believed to be a moral justification or extenuation for his conduct. (g) Whether or not the defendant acted under extreme duress or under the substantial domination of another person. (h) Whether or not at the time of the offense the capacity of the defendant to appreciate the criminality of his conduct or to conform his conduct to the requirements of law was impaired as a result of mental disease or defect or the affects [s”
10 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.