Darden v. Wainwright’s Empirical Analysis
725 F.2d 1526 · 1984
Citation profile
18 federal appellate ·
How this case has been cited
Cited by 39 later decisions (3 by the Supreme Court) — most recently May 2020 · most notably Wainwright v. Witt (1985), Darden v. Wainwright (1986)
18 federal appellate ·
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 28 U.S.C. § 2241 (Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996) · 28 U.S.C. § 2254 (Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996) · 28 U.S.C. § 2255 (Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996) · 28 U.S.C. § 46
Relies on Younger v. Harris · Wainwright v. Sykes · Cuyler v. Sullivan · Bonner v. City of Prichard · Witherspoon v. Illinois
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 39 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“Now I am going to ask each of you individually the same question so listen to me carefully, I want to know if any of you have such strong religious, moral or conscientious principles in opposition to the death penalty that you would be unwilling to vote to return an advisory sentence recommending the death sentence even though the facts presented to you should be such as under the law would require that recommendation? Do you understand my question?”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the concurrencee.g. Darden v. Wainwright“unmistakably clear that they would automatically vote against the imposition of capital punishment without regard to any evidence that might be developed at the trial of the case before them, or that their attitude toward the death penalty would prevent them from making an impartial decision as to the defendant's guilt.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Darden v. Wainwright“Do you have any moral or religious, conscientious moral or religious principles in opposition to the death penalty so strong that you would be unable without violating your own principles to vote to recommend a death penalty regardless of the facts?”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the concurrencee.g. Darden v. Wainwright
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.