united-states discrimination us-supreme-court law-in-fiction legislature
Insane Shonda Rhimes coincidence: The last name of the lead actors of HTGAWM and Scandal match the last names in Washington v Davis
<p>There's a cited court case in <em>How To Get Away With Murder</em> season 4, episode 13, called <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington_v._Davis" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Washington v Davis</a>. See <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/30974/washington-v-davis-in-how-to-get-away-with-murder">here</a> about the incorrect citation:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>In Washington v. Davis, your predecessors decided that even if a law has a discriminatory effect, it is unconstitutional if that was not its intended purpose.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>I just realised that Shonda Rhimes has these 2 series...</p>
<div class="s-table-container">
<table class="s-table">
<thead>
<tr>
<th style="text-align: left;">Series...</th>
<th style="text-align: left;">Scandal</th>
<th style="text-align: left;">HTGAWM</th>
</tr>
</thead>
<tbody>
<tr>
<td style="text-align: left;">has this lead character</td>
<td style="text-align: left;">Olivia Pope</td>
<td style="text-align: left;">Annalise Keating</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td style="text-align: left;">who is played by Lead Actor</td>
<td style="text-align: left;">Kerry <strong>Washington</strong></td>
<td style="text-align: left;">Viola <strong>Davis</strong></td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
</div>
<p>Question: Is there perhaps some court case similar to Washington v Davis in which case maybe Washington v Davis was just chosen to match the last names? Or is this really just an insane coincidence (<a href="https://movies.stackexchange.com/questions/104488/what-makes-the-tweety-bird-saw-a-romulan-joke-funny-in-the-original-version">like the tweety bird romulan joke in the French dub of TBBT</a>)?</p>

<p>There are many cases that announce the same rule as <em>Washington v. Davis</em>, as the same issue has come up in many cases in lower courts both before and after the Supreme Court decided it.</p>
<p>A competent attorney, however, would not cite to those cases in a Supreme Court argument when there was an on-point precedent from the Supreme Court itself.</p>
