Bush v. Viterna’s Empirical Analysis
795 F.2d 1203 · 1986
Citation profile
20 federal appellate · 3 district · 1 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 46 later decisions — most recently November 2013 · most notably Doe v. Taylor Independent School District (1994), Doe v. Rains County Independent School District (1995)
20 federal appellate · 3 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 42 U.S.C. § 1983 (Civil Rights Act of 1871 / Section 1983 (Ku Klux Klan Act))
Relies on Monell v. Department of Social Services of City of New York · Cleveland Board of Education v. Loudermill · Parratt v. Taylor · Pennhurst State School and Hospital v. Halderman · Daniels v. Williams
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 46 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“States have virtually complete freedom to decide who will be responsible for such tasks, and therewith to determine who will be held liable for civil rights violations that occur in the course of carrying them out.”
5 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the dissent“simply does not appear to have any state-imposed legal duty to correct jail violations or noncompliance that it becomes aware of.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the dissent“If the Commission on Jail Standards is not doing enough to carry out the State’s policy of reforming its County jails, the remedy must be sought in one of the three branches of the government of Texas. If any of the county jails are operating in violation of federal law, the remedy can be sought in a federal suit against the officials whom the state has designated to operate those facilities. Section 1983, however, cannot be used as a lash for whipping state governments into faster action on reform programs that, however desirable, are not required by federal law. Neither this nor any other federal court is authorized to step outside the limits of Article III and enlist itself in such well meaning assaults on the states and their people.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the dissente.g. Ortiz v. Turner
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.