Trafelet v. Thompson’s Empirical Analysis
594 F.2d 623 · 1979
Citation profile
28 federal appellate · 5 district · 19 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 81 later decisions — most recently June 2016 · most notably Malmed v. Thornburgh (1980), 481 F. Supp. 1315 - Shakman v. Democratic Organization of Cook Cty. (1979)
28 federal appellate · 5 district · 19 state decisions — followed in 11 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 Warth v. Seldin · Dandridge v. Williams · Williamson v. Lee Optical of Oklahoma, Inc. · Weinberger v. Salfi · City of New Orleans v. Dukes
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 81 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“It now seems readily apparent that these cases actually rest on an equal protection rationale, for the objectionable portion of each law was the way in which it classified individuals. It was arbitrary classification ... that was the impermissible basis of these laws. In none of the cases would a “process” have saved the law because the procedure would only have determined whether an individual fitted into one of these arbitrary classifications.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority“The equal protection clause does not prohibit the legislature from adopting a more rigorous policy for assuring excellence in the judiciary than for other elective offices.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. O'Connor v. Nevada“judges differently from other officials on the ground that the work of judges makes unique and exacting demands on faculties that age tends to erode,”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Gregory v. Ashcroft
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.