We document the quantitative manifestation of the Dewar-Knott color rule in a four-electron, three-orbital state-averaged complete active space self-consistent field (SA-CASSCF) model of a series of bridge-substituted cationic diarylmethanes. We show that the lowest excitation energies calculated using multireference perturbation theory based on the model are linearly correlated with the development of hole density in an orbital localized on the bridge, and the depletion of pair density in the same orbital. We quantitatively express the correlation in the form of a generalized Hammett equation. (c) 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.