Last updated: 1 November 2026. Holdings and citations were checked against the Supreme Court’s opinions, Oyez, Cornell’s Legal Information Institute and Justia. Recent cases without a United States Reports page are cited by docket number.
Short answer: The landmark Supreme Court cases every law student should know include Marbury v. Madison (judicial review), McCulloch v. Maryland (federal power), Brown v. Board of Education (school segregation), Miranda v. Arizona (police warnings), Dobbs v. Jackson (abortion) and Loper Bright (agency deference). Below are 50 cases grouped by subject, each with its holding and whether it is still good law in November 2026.
Key takeaways
- Learn cases by subject, not by date. Core courses draw on the same small set of decisions again and again.
- Several famous cases are no longer good law: Roe and Casey fell in Dobbs (2022), Chevron fell in Loper Bright (2024) and Humphrey’s Executor fell in Trump v. Slaughter (29 June 2026).
- Lochner, Korematsu and the Lemon test were abandoned or repudiated rather than formally overruled. Know the later case that did it.
- For each case, be able to state the facts, issue, holding and reasoning in a few lines. That is what a case brief is for.
How were these 50 landmark cases chosen?
These cases recur in law school courses and on the bar exam. “Good law” means the Court has not overruled the case, even if later decisions narrowed it. Our guide to how long law school takes shows where these courses fall in the JD.
Which constitutional structure cases should you know?
| Case and citation | Year | Holding and why it matters | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Marbury v. Madison, 5 U.S. (1 Cranch) 137 | 1803 | Courts may refuse to apply a statute that conflicts with the Constitution. The foundation of judicial review. | Good law |
| McCulloch v. Maryland, 17 U.S. (4 Wheat.) 316 | 1819 | Congress could charter a national bank under the Necessary and Proper Clause, and a state could not tax it. | Good law |
| Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer, 343 U.S. 579 | 1952 | Truman could not seize steel mills without congressional authority. Justice Jackson’s concurrence is still the test for presidential power. | Good law |
| United States v. Nixon, 418 U.S. 683 | 1974 | Executive privilege is not absolute; the President had to produce the Watergate tapes for a criminal trial. | Good law |
| INS v. Chadha, 462 U.S. 919 | 1983 | A one-house legislative veto breaches bicameralism and presentment. | Good law |
| Humphrey’s Executor v. United States, 295 U.S. 602 | 1935 | Congress could protect FTC commissioners from removal except for cause. | Overruled by Trump v. Slaughter (2026) |
| Trump v. United States, 603 U.S. 593 | 2024 | A former President has absolute immunity for core constitutional acts, presumptive immunity for other official acts and none for unofficial acts. | Good law |
| Trump v. Slaughter, No. 25-332 | 2026 | By 6 to 3, the FTC’s for-cause removal protection is unconstitutional; the Court overruled Humphrey’s Executor but left the Federal Reserve open. | Good law |
Read the Slaughter slip opinion alongside Humphrey’s Executor, or start with our Trump v. Slaughter explainer.
Which federalism and commerce cases matter most?
| Case and citation | Year | Holding and why it matters | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Gibbons v. Ogden, 22 U.S. (9 Wheat.) 1 | 1824 | “Commerce” includes navigation, so a federal licence overrode New York’s steamboat monopoly. | Good law |
| Wickard v. Filburn, 317 U.S. 111 | 1942 | Congress could regulate wheat a farmer grew for his own use, because such activity in aggregate affects interstate commerce. | Good law |
| Heart of Atlanta Motel v. United States, 379 U.S. 241 | 1964 | Upheld the Civil Rights Act of 1964’s ban on race discrimination by motels serving interstate travellers. | Good law |
| United States v. Lopez, 514 U.S. 549 | 1995 | The Gun-Free School Zones Act exceeded the commerce power, the first such limit in decades. | Good law |
| NFIB v. Sebelius, 567 U.S. 519 | 2012 | The Affordable Care Act’s individual mandate failed under the Commerce Clause but survived as a tax; states could not be coerced into Medicaid expansion. | Good law |
Which free speech and religion cases are essential?
| Case and citation | Year | Holding and why it matters | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254 | 1964 | A public official suing for defamation must prove “actual malice”: knowledge of falsity or reckless disregard for the truth. | Good law |
| Brandenburg v. Ohio, 395 U.S. 444 | 1969 | Advocacy of force is protected unless it is directed to inciting imminent lawless action and likely to produce it. | Good law |
| Tinker v. Des Moines, 393 U.S. 503 | 1969 | Students could wear black armbands against the Vietnam War; schools may restrict speech only if it causes substantial disruption. | Good law |
| Citizens United v. FEC, 558 U.S. 310 | 2010 | The government may not ban independent political spending by corporations and unions. | Good law |
| Lemon v. Kurtzman, 403 U.S. 602 | 1971 | Set a three-part Establishment Clause test: secular purpose, primary effect, no excessive entanglement. | Abandoned in Kennedy v. Bremerton (2022) |
| Employment Division v. Smith, 494 U.S. 872 | 1990 | Neutral, generally applicable laws do not violate the Free Exercise Clause even if they burden religious practice. | Good law; Congress responded with RFRA (1993) |
Which criminal procedure cases come up most?
| Case and citation | Year | Holding and why it matters | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mapp v. Ohio, 367 U.S. 643 | 1961 | Evidence from an unconstitutional search is excluded in state courts too. | Good law |
| Gideon v. Wainwright, 372 U.S. 335 | 1963 | States must provide a lawyer to defendants charged with felonies who cannot afford one. | Good law |
| Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436 | 1966 | Statements from custodial interrogation are inadmissible unless the suspect was warned of the rights to silence and counsel. | Good law; reaffirmed in Dickerson (2000) |
| Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347 | 1967 | Bugging a phone booth was a search; the Fourth Amendment protects people, not places. Source of the “reasonable expectation of privacy” test. | Good law |
| Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1 | 1968 | Police may stop someone on reasonable suspicion of crime and frisk them if they reasonably believe the person is armed. | Good law |
| Carpenter v. United States, 585 U.S. 296 | 2018 | Police generally need a warrant to obtain historical cell-site location records. | Good law |
Read Miranda itself with Vega v. Tekoh (2022), which held that a Miranda violation alone does not support a civil rights suit. For the practical side, see why you should not talk to police without a lawyer.
Which equal protection and civil rights cases should you know?
| Case and citation | Year | Holding and why it matters | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dred Scott v. Sandford, 60 U.S. (19 How.) 393 | 1857 | Black Americans could not be citizens and Congress could not ban slavery in the territories. | Superseded by the 13th and 14th Amendments |
| Plessy v. Ferguson, 163 U.S. 537 | 1896 | Upheld “separate but equal” segregation on railways. | Rejected by Brown (1954) |
| Korematsu v. United States, 323 U.S. 214 | 1944 | Upheld the wartime exclusion of Japanese Americans from the West Coast. | Repudiated in Trump v. Hawaii (2018) |
| Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U.S. 483 | 1954 | State-mandated school segregation violates equal protection: “separate educational facilities are inherently unequal.” | Good law |
| Loving v. Virginia, 388 U.S. 1 | 1967 | Bans on interracial marriage violate equal protection and due process. | Good law |
| Shelby County v. Holder, 570 U.S. 529 | 2013 | Struck down the Voting Rights Act’s coverage formula, ending federal preclearance unless Congress writes a new one. | Good law |
| Obergefell v. Hodges, 576 U.S. 644 | 2015 | States must license and recognise same-sex marriages. | Good law |
| Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard, 600 U.S. 181 | 2023 | Race-conscious admissions at Harvard and the University of North Carolina violated equal protection and Title VI. | Good law; effectively ended Grutter (2003) |
| Bostock v. Clayton County, 590 U.S. 644 | 2020 | Firing someone for being gay or transgender is discrimination “because of sex” under Title VII. | Good law |
The text of Brown v. Board of Education is short enough to read in one sitting. Bostock now anchors workplace sex discrimination claims, as our hostile work environment guide explains.
Which privacy, due process and Second Amendment cases matter?
| Case and citation | Year | Holding and why it matters | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lochner v. New York, 198 U.S. 45 | 1905 | Struck down a maximum-hours law for bakers as a breach of liberty of contract. | Repudiated in West Coast Hotel v. Parrish (1937) |
| Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479 | 1965 | A ban on contraceptives for married couples violated a constitutional right of privacy. | Good law |
| Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113 | 1973 | Recognised a constitutional right to abortion under a trimester framework. | Overruled by Dobbs (2022) |
| Planned Parenthood v. Casey, 505 U.S. 833 | 1992 | Kept Roe’s core but replaced trimesters with an “undue burden” test. | Overruled by Dobbs (2022) |
| Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558 | 2003 | Criminalising private consensual same-sex intimacy violates due process; overruled Bowers v. Hardwick. | Good law |
| Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, 597 U.S. 215 | 2022 | The Constitution does not confer a right to abortion; the issue returns to the states. | Good law |
| District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570 | 2008 | The Second Amendment protects an individual right to keep a handgun at home for self-defence. | Good law; extended by Bruen (2022) |
The Dobbs opinion also sets out when the Court will overrule precedent. Our overview of abortion laws in the United States gives the background.
Which administrative law cases changed the field?
| Case and citation | Year | Holding and why it matters | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Chevron U.S.A. v. NRDC, 467 U.S. 837 | 1984 | Courts deferred to an agency’s reasonable reading of an ambiguous statute. | Overruled by Loper Bright (2024) |
| Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, 603 U.S. 369 | 2024 | Courts must decide for themselves what a statute means and may not defer to an agency just because the law is ambiguous. | Good law |
| West Virginia v. EPA, 597 U.S. 697 | 2022 | Agencies need clear congressional authority for decisions of vast economic and political significance (the “major questions” doctrine). | Good law |
| SEC v. Jarkesy, 603 U.S. 109 | 2024 | When the SEC seeks civil penalties for securities fraud, the defendant is entitled to a jury trial. | Good law |
Start any administrative law course with the Loper Bright opinion.
Which business, civil procedure and IP cases should you know?
| Case and citation | Year | Holding and why it matters | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Erie Railroad Co. v. Tompkins, 304 U.S. 64 | 1938 | Federal courts hearing state-law claims apply state substantive law; there is no federal general common law. | Good law |
| International Shoe Co. v. Washington, 326 U.S. 310 | 1945 | Personal jurisdiction requires “minimum contacts” consistent with “fair play and substantial justice.” | Good law |
| Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544 | 2007 | A complaint must plead enough facts to make a claim plausible; extended to all civil cases by Ashcroft v. Iqbal (2009). | Good law |
| Diamond v. Chakrabarty, 447 U.S. 303 | 1980 | A genetically engineered bacterium is patentable subject matter. | Good law |
| Alice Corp. v. CLS Bank International, 573 U.S. 208 | 2014 | Claims to an abstract idea carried out on a generic computer are not patentable; set the two-step eligibility test. | Good law |
Which landmark cases are no longer good law?
Roe and Casey fell in Dobbs (24 June 2022), Chevron in Loper Bright (28 June 2024) and Humphrey’s Executor in Trump v. Slaughter (29 June 2026). In Trump v. Hawaii (2018), Chief Justice Roberts wrote that Korematsu “was gravely wrong the day it was decided,” and Kennedy v. Bremerton (2022) replaced the Lemon test with history and tradition.
How should you study a landmark case?
Write a one-page brief for every case you read, with six parts:
- Facts: who did what to whom, in a few sentences.
- Procedural history: what the lower courts decided.
- Issue: the legal question, phrased so it can be answered yes or no.
- Holding: the answer, and the rule the case stands for.
- Reasoning: why the majority decided as it did, plus key points from any dissent.
- Later history: whether the case has been followed, narrowed or overruled.
Read the syllabus first, then the majority, then the dissent. Our Donoghue v Stevenson case summary applies the same method to a classic negligence case, and Oyez pages such as its Marbury v. Madison entry give quick summaries for revision.
Frequently asked questions
What is the most important Supreme Court case of all time?
Many scholars would name Marbury v. Madison (1803), because it established that courts can refuse to apply laws that conflict with the Constitution. Without judicial review, most other cases on this list could not have been decided. Brown v. Board of Education (1954) is a common answer for the case that most changed American society.
Is Roe v. Wade still law?
No. Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, decided on 24 June 2022, overruled both Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey and held that the Constitution does not confer a right to abortion. Each state now sets its own abortion law.
What replaced Chevron deference?
Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, decided on 28 June 2024, held that the Administrative Procedure Act requires courts to decide for themselves what a statute means. Courts may still find an agency’s view persuasive but no longer defer to it because a statute is ambiguous. Past decisions that relied on Chevron remain binding.
Was Humphrey’s Executor overruled?
Yes. In Trump v. Slaughter, decided 6 to 3 on 29 June 2026, the Court held the FTC Act’s for-cause removal protection unconstitutional and overruled whatever remained of Humphrey’s Executor (1935). Chief Justice Roberts wrote for the majority, and the Court left open whether the Federal Reserve is different.
How many Supreme Court cases do law students need to know?
There is no fixed number. A first-year constitutional law course covers several dozen cases, and the bar exam tests the rules from many of them rather than case names. Knowing around 50 core cases well, with their holdings and current status, gives a solid base for both.
Where can I read Supreme Court opinions for free?
The Supreme Court publishes recent slip opinions on supremecourt.gov. Older decisions are free on Cornell’s Legal Information Institute and Justia, and Oyez adds summaries and oral argument audio for modern cases. Cite the United States Reports where a page number exists, and the docket number for recent cases.
This article is general educational information about US Supreme Court decisions as of 1 November 2026, not legal advice. Summaries simplify, so read the full opinion and check later history before relying on a case.
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