Downing v. Cook’s Empirical Analysis
1982
Citation profile
63 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 67 later decisions — most recently July 2025 · most notably Mominee v. Scherbarth (1986), Gerijo, Inc. v. City of Fairfield (1994)
63 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
Relies on Porter v. City of Oberlin · Village of West Jefferson v. Robinson · Wilson v. City of Cincinnati · State v. Renalist, 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 67 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“Although almost every exercise of the police power will necessarily either interfere with the enjoyment of liberty or the acquisition, possession and production of property, within the meaning of Section I of Article I of the Ohio Constitution, or involve an injury to a person within the meaning of Section I of Article XIV of the Amendments to the Constitution of the United States any exercise of the police power having such an effect will be valid if it bears a real and substantial relation to the public health, safety, morals or general welfare of the public and if it is not unreasonable or arbitrary. Whether an exercise of the police power does bear a real and substantial relation to the public health, safety, morals or general welfare of the public and whether it is unreasonable or arbitrary are questions which are committed in the first instance to the judgment and discretion of the legislative body, and, unless the decisions of such legislative body on those questions appear to be clearly erroneous, the courts will not invalidate them.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“[a] legislative body may enact legislation declaring that previously lawful activity will thereafter be deemed a nuisance.”
1 later decision 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.