Williams v. Wright’s Empirical Analysis
927 F.2d 1540 · 1991
Citation profile
47 federal appellate · 11 district · 4 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 114 later decisions — most recently April 2021 · most notably Watkins v. Westinghouse Hanford Company (1994), Willett v. Blue Cross & Blue Shield (1992)
47 federal appellate · 11 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 29 U.S.C. § 1002 (§ 3 of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974) · 29 U.S.C. § 1103 (§ 403 of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974) · 29 U.S.C. § 1132 (§ 502 of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974) · 29 U.S.C. § 1144 (§ 514 of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974)
Relies on Bonner v. City of Prichard · Shaw v. Delta Air Lines, Inc. · Pilot Life Insurance v. Dedeaux · Fort Halifax Packing Co. v. Coyne · Nachman Corp. v. Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation
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 114 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“(1) a’plan, fund or program’ (2) established or maintained (3) by an employer or by an employee organization, or by both, (4) for the purpose of providing medical, surgical, hospital care, sickness, accident, disability, death, unemployment or vacation benefits, apprenticeship or other training programs, day care centers, scholarship funds, prepaid legal services or severance benefits (5) to participants or their beneficiaries.”
5 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“[A]ny plan, fund, or program which was heretofore or is hereafter established or maintained by an employer or by an employee organization, or by both, to the extent that by its express terms or as a result of surrounding circumstances such plan, fund, or program— (i) provides retirement income to employees, or (ii) results in a deferral of income by employees for periods extending to the termination of covered employment or beyond, regardless of the method of calculating the contributions made to the plan, the method of calculating the benefits under the plan or the method of distributing benefits from the plan.”
4 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“'ascertain the intended benefits, beneficiaries, source of financing, and procedures for receiving benefits'.... That is clearly a sufficient allegation of the establishment of a plan.”
4 later decisions 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.