Knapp v. Whitaker’s Empirical Analysis
757 F.2d 827 · 1985
Citation profile
94 federal appellate · 3 district · 8 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 161 later decisions — most recently August 2025 · most notably Conaway v. Smith (1988), Rakovich v. Wade (1988)
94 federal appellate · 3 district · 8 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 42 U.S.C. § 1983 (Civil Rights Act of 1871 / Section 1983 (Ku Klux Klan Act))
Relies on Harlow v. Fitzgerald · Foman v. Davis · Mt. Healthy City School District Board of Education v. Doyle · Pickering v. Board of Education of Township High School District 205 Will County Illinois · Connick v. Myers
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 161 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“When a public employee speaks not as a citizen upon matters of public concern, but instead as an employee upon matters of only a personal interest, absent the most unusual circumstances, the federal court is not the appropriate forum in which to review the wisdom of a personnel decision taken by a public agency allegedly in reaction to the employee’s behavior.”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“If the speech is deemed a matter of public concern, the court must then engage in the Pickering balancing test, weighing the interest of the public employee, as a citizen, in commenting upon matters of public concern with the interest of the State, as an employer, in promoting effective and efficient public service.”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“(1) whether the speech impeded the employee's ability to perform her responsibilities; (2) the importance of close working relationships with superiors and co-workers; (3) the time, place, and manner in which the speech was delivered; and (4) the context in which the underlying dispute arose.”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Ohse v. Hughes · Volkman v. Ryker
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.