Smith v. United States’s Empirical Analysis
94 U.S. 97 · 1876
Citation profile
130 federal appellate · 6 district · 84 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 292 later decisions (15 by the Supreme Court) — most recently June 2024 · most notably United States v. Sharpe (1985), Molinaro v. New Jersey (1970)
130 federal appellate · 6 district · 84 state decisions — followed in 33 states
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
Relies on Selma and Meridian Railroad Company v. Louisiana National Bank of New Orleans · Commonwealth v. Andrews · People of the State of N.Y. v. . Genet · Bullen v. Arnold
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 292 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“* * * In this case it is admitted that the plaintiff in error has escaped, and is not within the control of the court below, either actually, by being in custody, or constructively, by being out on bail. If we affirm the judgment, he is not likely to appear to submit to his sentence. If we reverse it and order a new trial, he will appear or not, as he may consider most for his interest. Under such circumstances, we are not inclined to hear and decide what may prove to be only a moot case.”
9 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.