Forsyth v. Kleindienst’s Empirical Analysis
729 F.2d 267 · 1984
Citation profile
22 federal appellate · 3 district · 3 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 33 later decisions (1 by the Supreme Court) — most recently August 2009 · most notably Mitchell v. Forsyth (1985), Elliott v. Perez (1985)
22 federal appellate · 3 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
Relationships
Applies 18 U.S.C. § 2511 (Electronic Communications Privacy Act of 1986) · 28 U.S.C. § 1291 · 28 U.S.C. § 1292 · 47 U.S.C. § 605
Relies on Harlow v. Fitzgerald · Scheuer v. Rhodes · Katz v. United States · Cohen v. Beneficial Industrial Loan Corp. · Imbler v. Pachtman
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 33 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““[C]oncern over subjecting government officials to unwarranted claims is best handled through adjustment of the substantive rules of law, as the Supreme Court has recently done, and not by changing the established practice of limiting appellate review of interlocutory decisions.” Forsyth, ante, 729 F.2d at 273.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“[B]are allegations of malice should not suffice to subject government officials either to the costs of trial or to the burdens of broad-reaching discovery. We therefore hold that government officials performing discretionary functions generally are shielded from liability for civil damages insofar as their conduct does not violate clearly established statutory or constitutional rights of which a reasonable person would have known. Reliance on the objective reasonableness of an official’s conduct, as measured by reference to clearly established law, should avoid excessive disruption of government and permit the resolution of many insubstantial claims on summary judgment. On summary judgment, the judge appropriately may determine, not only the currently applicable law, but whether that law was clearly established at the time an action occurred. If the law at that time was not clearly established, an official could not reasonably be expected to anticipate subsequent legal developments, nor could he fairly be said to “know” that the law forbade conduct not previously identified as unlawful____ If the law was clearly established, the immunity defense ordinarily should fail, since a reasonably competent public official should know the law governing his conduct.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the dissent“The denial of a claim of absolute immunity is an interlocutory order appealable under the collateral order doctrine of Cohen v. Beneficial Industrial Loan Corp., 337 U.S. 541 , 69 S.Ct. 1221 , 93 L.Ed. 1528 (1949).”
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.