Advocate Health Care Network v. Stapleton’s Empirical Analysis
2017
Citation profile
20 federal appellate · 4 district · 3 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 72 later decisions (6 by the Supreme Court) — most recently March 2025 · most notably Food Marketing Institute v. Argus Leader Media (2019), Consumer Data Industry Assoc. v. Frey (2022)
20 federal appellate · 4 district · 3 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
reviewedRollins v. Dignity Health (from Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals)
Relationships
Applies 29 U.S.C. § 1002 (§ 3 of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974) · 29 U.S.C. § 1003 (§ 4 of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974)
Relies on Williams v. Taylor · New York State Conference of Blue Cross & Blue Shield Plans v. Travelers Insurance · United States v. Detroit Timber & Lumber Co. · LOCKHEED CORP. Et Al. v. SPINK · Fort Wayne Books, Inc. v. Indiana
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 72 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“A plan established and maintained for its employees (or their beneficiaries) by a church or by a convention or association of churches includes a plan maintained by an organization, whether a civil law corporation or otherwise, the principal purpose or function of which is the administration or funding of a plan or program for the provision of retirement benefits or welfare benefits, or both, for the employees of a church or a convention or association of churches, if such organization is controlled by or associated with a church or a convention or association of churches.”
5 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“When legislators did not adopt 'obvious alternative' language, 'the natural implication is that they did not intend' the alternative.”
4 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“presum[e] that each word Congress uses is there for a reason,”
3 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.