Lawrence v. Westerhaus’s Empirical Analysis
749 F.2d 494 · 1984
Citation profile
65 federal appellate · 17 district · 1 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 118 later decisions — most recently February 2025 · most notably 40 Fair empl.prac.cas. 1597, 41 Empl. Prac. Dec. P 36,451 Irving P. Gray v. New England Telephone and Telegraph Company, Irving P. Gray v. New England Telephone and Telegraph Company (1986), Lutheran Medical Center of Omaha Nebraska v. Contractors Laborers Teamsters and Engineers Health and Welfare Plan (1994)
65 federal appellate · 17 district · 1 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
Applies 29 U.S.C. § 1132 (§ 502 of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974)
Relies on Iron Workers Local # 272 v. Bowen · Fase v. Seafarers Welfare & Pension Plan
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 118 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“(1) the degree of culpability or bad faith of the opposing party; (2) the ability of the opposing party to pay attorney fees; (3) whether an award of attorney fees against the opposing party might have a future deterrent effect under similar circumstances; (4) whether the parties requesting attorney fees sought to benefit all participants and beneficiaries of a plan or to resolve a significant legal question regarding ERISA itself; and (5) the relative merits of the parties’ positions.”
26 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“[A] court may properly deny a claim for attorneys' fees solely on the ground that the plaintiff obtained no relief under the statute.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. 14 Employee Benefits Cas. 2769, 17 Ucc rep.serv.2d 583 Gary L. Cattin and Thomas F. Omans (90-1016), Plaintiffs-Appellants/cross-Appellees v. General Motors Corporation (90-1051) Electronic Data Systems Corporation (90-1052), Defendants-Appellees/cross-Appellants · Jackson v. Metropolitan Life Insurance
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.