Clark v. Jeter’s Empirical Analysis
1988
Citation profile
210 federal appellate · 110 district · 464 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 1,124 later decisions (25 by the Supreme Court) — most recently June 2026 · most notably Arizona v. Youngblood (1989), JEB v. Alabama Ex Rel. TB (1994)
210 federal appellate · 110 district · 464 state decisions — followed in 38 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 San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez · Craig v. Boren · Loving v. Commonwealth of Virginia · Harper v. Virginia State Board of Elections Butts · United Families of America v. Kendrick
Cited together with City of Cleburne Texas v. Cleburne Living Center · Craig v. Boren · United States v. Virginia · Mississippi University for Women v. Hogan · Heller v. Doe Ex Rel. Doe
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 1,124 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“apply different levels of scrutiny to different types of classifications. At a minimum, a statutory classification must be rationally related to a legitimate governmental purpose.... Classifications based on race or national origin ... and classifications affecting fundamental rights ... are given the most exacting scrutiny. Between these extremes of rational basis review and strict scrutiny lies a level of intermediate scrutiny, which generally has been applied to discriminatory classifications based on sex or illegitimacy.”
38 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“substantially related to an important governmental objective.”
17 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“not necessarily provide a reasonable opportunity to assert a claim on behalf of an illegitimate child.”
5 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.