Spring Motors Distributors, Inc. v. Ford Motor Co.’s Empirical Analysis
1985
Citation profile
50 federal appellate · 67 district · 136 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 299 later decisions (2 by the Supreme Court) — most recently February 2026 · most notably East River Steamship Corp. v. Transamerica Delaval Inc. (1986), Chemtrol Adhesives, Inc. v. American Manufacturers Mutual Insurance (1989)
50 federal appellate · 67 district · 136 state decisions — followed in 17 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
Applies 15 U.S.C. § 2301 (Magnuson-Moss Warranty—Federal Trade Commission Improvement Act)
Relies on Greenman v. Yuba Power Products, Inc. · MacPherson v. . Buick Motor Co. · 63 Cal. 2d 9 - Seely v. White Motor Co. · 91 Ill. 2d 69 - Moorman Manufacturing Co. v. National Tank Co. · Henningsen v. Bloomfield Motors, Inc.
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 299 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“'is generally regarded as the exclusive source for ascertaining when a seller is subject to liability for damages if the claim is based on intangible economic loss not attributable to physical injury to person or harm to a tangible thing other than the defective product itself.'”
37 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“a commercial buyer seeking damages for economic loss resulting from the purchase of defective goods may recover ... for breach of warranty under the U.C.C., but not in ... negligence.”
9 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“the U.C.C. is the more appropriate vehicle for resolving commercial disputes arising out of business transactions between persons in a distributive chain.”
6 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.