decisive factor
Definitions from Case Law · United States Supreme Court
Definitions from Case Law
From 457 U.S. 853 - Board of Ed., Island Trees Union Free School Dist. No. 26 v. Pico · 1982Most cited · 1,137 citing opinions
a "substantial factor" in the absence of which the opposite decision would have been reached.
How often courts cite the case defining “decisive factor”
Court decisions citing the opinion that defined “decisive factor” — 1,125 in all, by decade. Counts are citations to the defining case as a whole, not verified uses of the term. The dip in the most recent years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the latest years.