Weisberg v. Webster’s Empirical Analysis
749 F.2d 864 · 1984
Citation profile
21 federal appellate · 25 district · 4 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 68 later decisions — most recently July 2021 · most notably Westmoreland v. CBS, Inc. (1985), Shepherd v. American Broadcasting Companies (1995)
21 federal appellate · 25 district · 4 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 5 U.S.C. § 552 (Freedom of Information Act)
Relies on Hickman v. Taylor · National Hockey League v. Metropolitan Hockey Club, Inc. · Societe Internationale Pour Participations Industrielles Et Commerciales, S. A. v. Rogers · Flaks v. Koegel · United States v. Sumitomo Marine & Fire Insurance
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 68 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“[t]he government should be able to use the discovery rules in FOIA suits like any other litigant, to uncover facts which will enable it to meet its burden of proving ... the adequacy of its search.”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“Litigants who are willful in halting the discovery process act in opposition to the authority of the court and cause impermissible prejudice to their opponents. It is even more important to note, in this era of crowded dockets, that they also deprive other litigants of an opportunity to use the courts as a serious dispute-settlement mechanism, [footnote omitted]”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“The requirement of specific findings is found in many of our cases dealing with sanctions under Rule 37. For example, Judge Burger’s concurrence in Von der Heydt v. Rogers [(C.A.D.C. 1958), 251 F.2d 17, 18 ] suggested that this Court rely on its “inherent power to call for findings in aid of appellate review” to remand to the district court for findings in a case involving failure to produce certain documents. That same action was taken in Smith v. Schlesinger [(C.A.D.C.1975), 509 F.2d 538 ]. In Crawford v. American Federation of Government Employees [(D.D.C.1983), 576 F.Supp. 812, 815 ] the District Court for the District of Columbia adopted the view that an award of costs under Rule 37 against an attorney ought to be justified by reasons distinct from those justifying an award against the client. Several other cases have either remanded for a specific division of liability between attorney and client, or affirmatively explained the rationale for imposing an award against the attorney. [See, e.g., United States v. Sumitomo Marine & Fire Ins. Co. (C.A.9, 1980), 617 F.2d 1365 .] This requirement of findings to support an award of expenses against an attorney is prompted by the structure of Rule 37, by concerns for effective appellate review, and by concerns for the tension created in the attorney-client relationship when the attorney is subject to personal liability. Rule 37 places the responsibility of apportioning awards of expenses between client and counsel with the trial ”
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.