Phillips v. Mathews’s Empirical Analysis
547 F.3d 905 · 2008
Citation profile
29 federal appellate · 9 district · 2 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 73 later decisions — most recently May 2025 · most notably Wierman v. Casey's General Stores (2011), Lichtenstein v. University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (2012)
29 federal appellate · 9 district · 2 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
Applies 29 U.S.C. § 2611 (§ 101 of the Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993) · 29 U.S.C. § 2612 (§ 102 of the Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993) · 29 U.S.C. § 2614 (§ 104 of the Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993) · 29 U.S.C. § 2615 (§ 105 of the Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993) · 42 U.S.C. § 2000E (§ 704 of the Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964)
Relies on McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green · Hodgens v. General Dynamics Corp. · Conoshenti v. Public Service Electric & Gas Co. · Smith v. Allen Health Systems Inc. · Cline v. Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.
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 73 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“[t]here are two types of claims under the FMLA: (1) “interference” or “(a)(1)” claims in which the employee alleges that an employer denied or interfered with his substantive rights under the FMLA and (2) “retaliation” or “(a)(2)” claims in which the employee alleges that the employer discriminated against him for exercising his FMLA rights.”
4 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“An employee may prove pretext by demonstrating that the employer’s proffered reason has no basis in fact, that the employee received a favorable review shortly before he was terminated, that similarly situated employees who did not engage in the protected activity were treated more leniently, that the employer changed its explanation for why it fired the employee, or that the employer deviated from its policies.”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“`every discharge of an employee while she is taking FMLA leave interferes with an employee's FMLA rights.'”
2 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.