Case Citator › Palko v. Connecticut

Palko v. Connecticut

Is it still good law? What later courts have actually done to this case.

Overruled
Court
Supreme Court of the United States
Citation
302 U.S. 319
Decided
Confirmed treatments
3
Flagged citations read
195 of 197
Citing cases (total)
2,059
Treatment dates
1968–1978
Overruled
A reviewed court has overruled this case. Palko v. Connecticut is overruled: 195 of the 197 flagged citations were read; the text of the other 2 could not be retrieved, and the 3 confirmed treatments are listed below. The Supreme Court rejected Palko's dicta that the criminal-jury right was not essential to ordered liberty, then expressly overruled Palko's holding that the Fifth Amendment's Double Jeopardy Clause did not apply to the States.
More on how this was screened

Plante v. Gonzalez later criticized Palko's ordered-liberty formulation as unhelpful and of questionable strength. The other readable opinions applied unaffected language from Palko or merely reported the Supreme Court's acts in Duncan v. Louisiana and Benton v. Maryland.

The treatments below are confirmed; unread citations could still change the overall status.
Every treatment on this page is written from the citing opinion itself, with a verbatim quote, never copied from a commercial citator. A citation flagged by our screen but not shown here was read and found not to weaken this case, except the ones whose text could not be retrieved.

2,059 later cases cite Palko v. Connecticut; 197 of those citations sat close to treatment language and were flagged for reading; 195 of them have been read, and the text of 2 citing opinions could not be retrieved, so those remain unread. Citations that did not sit near treatment language were not flagged and were not read one by one, so a court that weakened this case without using any of that language would not appear here.

Relying on Palko v. Connecticut?

This page shows what later courts did to it. Ask about your specific facts and see whether it still carries your argument, with citations you can check.

Treatments

Overruled

  • The Supreme Court overruled Palko's holding that the Fifth Amendment's Double Jeopardy Clause did not apply to the States through the Fourteenth Amendment.

    Benton v. Maryland · Supreme Court of the United States · filed

    For the same reasons, we today find that the double jeopardy prohibition of the Fifth Amendment represents a fundamental ideal in our constitutional heritage, and that it should apply to the States through the Fourteenth Amendment. Insofar as it is inconsistent with this holding, Palko v. Connecticut is overruled.
    Read the full opinion on CourtListener →

Declined to follow

  • The Supreme Court rejected Palko's dicta that the right to a jury trial in serious criminal cases was not essential to ordered liberty and could be denied by the States.

    Duncan v. Louisiana · Supreme Court of the United States · filed

    In neither Palko nor Snyder was jury trial actually at issue, although both cases contain important dicta asserting that the right to jury trial is not essential to ordered liberty and may be dispensed with by the States regardless of the Sixth and Fourteenth Amendments. ... In Malloy v. Hogan, supra, the Court rejected Palko’s discussion of the self-incrimination clause. Respectfully, we reject the prior dicta regarding jury trial in criminal cases.
    Read the full opinion on CourtListener →

Criticized

  • The court criticized Palko's ordered-liberty formulation as unhelpful and of questionable strength, and described its broader incorporation position as unsuccessful.

    Plante v. Gonzalez · Fifth Circuit · filed

    The defendants, and the district court, prefer the language the Court used in Palko v. Connecticut, 1937, 302 U.S. 319, 58 S.Ct. 149, 82 L.Ed. 288, concerning rights “implicit in the concept of ordered liberty”. Neither standard appears helpful. Both authorities are of questionable strength. Meyer comes to us from the heyday of substantive due process analysis. Palko’s specific holding was overruled in Benton v. Maryland, 1969, 395 U.S. 784, 89 S.Ct. 2056, 23 L.Ed.2d 707. Its broader significance is as a statement of the ultimately unsuccessful position in the “incorporation debate” concerning the fourteenth amendment.
    Read the full opinion on CourtListener →

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