Slack v. McDaniel’s Empirical Analysis
2000
Citation profile
1,938 federal appellate · 937 district · 33 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 48,042 later decisions (50 by the Supreme Court) — most recently June 2025 · most notably Miller-El v. Cockrell Director Texas Department of Criminal Justice Institutional Division (2003), Rose v. Lee (2001)
1,938 federal appellate · 937 district · 33 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.
Appellate journey
reviewedIn re Turner (from Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals)
Relationships
Applies 28 U.S.C. § 2253 (Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996) · 28 U.S.C. § 2254 (Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996)
Relies on Rose v. Lundy · Lindh v. Murphy · Ashwander v. Tennessee Valley Authority · McCleskey v. Zant
Cited together with Miller-El v. Cockrell Director Texas Department of Criminal Justice Institutional Division · Strickland v. Washington · Williams v. Taylor · Coleman v. Thompson · Brecht v. Abrahamson
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 48,042 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“When the district court denies a habeas petition on procedural grounds without reaching the prisoner’s underlying constitutional claim, a COA should issue when the prisoner shows, at least, that jurists of reason would find it debatable whether the petition states a valid claim of the denial of a constitutional right and that jurists of reason would find it debatable whether the district court was correct in its procedural ruling.”
244 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“a substantial showing of the denial of a constitutional right.”
119 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“that jurists of reason would find it debatable whether the district court was correct in its procedural ruling.”
62 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Scott v. Collins · Rosas v. Nielsen
How later courts have treated this case
Across 175 classified citations — whether each later court relied on, limited, or rejected this decision:
- 98followed
- 49explained
- 23cited without characterization
- 5distinguished
Treatment is classified from each citing court's own sentence. This is a running sample — coverage grows as the classification pass proceeds; overrulings are also tracked authoritatively in the case status.