The issue was whether a prevailing defendant in a civil rights case may recover attorneys' fees for all work expended in a case that included a frivolous issue. While prevailing plaintiffs routinely recover attorneys' fees under 42 U.S.C. sec. 1988, prevailing defendants only recover fees if the case was totally frivolous. So the issue here was, can the defendant in that circumstance get all his fees even if only one issue was frivolous?

egulate “ghost guns” via the Gun Control Act of 1968 (the “1968 Act”). The Fifth Circuit struck down a 2022 U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms regulation after concluding that the 1968 Act’s plain meaning of “firearm” did not include kits to assemble firearms. The questions presented are: (1) Whether “a weapon parts kit that is designed to or may readily be completed, assembled, restored, or otherwise converted to expel a projectile by the action of an explosive” under 27 C.F.R. § 478.11 is a “firearm” regulated by the 1968 Act; and (2) whether “a partially complete, disassembled, or nonfunctional frame or receiver” that is “designed to or may readily be completed, assembled, restored, or otherwise converted to function as a frame or receiver” under 27 C.F.R. § 478.12(c) is a “frame or receiver” regulated by the 1968 Act.Lackey v. Stinnie, No. 23-621: This case addresses the circumstances when a “prevailing party” is entitled to attorneys’ fees in a civil rights lawsuit via 42 U.S.C. § 1988. In this case, the plaintiff obtained a preliminary injunction against the enforcement of a Virginia statute after the district court concluded the plaintiff was likely to succeed on the merits. However, the law was repealed before the case went to trial. The questions presented are: (1) Whether a party must obtain a ruling that conclusively decides the merits in its favor, as opposed to merely predicting a likelihood of later success, to prevail on the merits under 42 U.S.C. § 1988; and (2) whether a party must obtain an enduring change in the parties’ legal relationship from a judicial act, as opposed to a non-judicial event that moots the case, to prevail under Section 1988.

urt of Appeals sitting en banc in Stinnie, et al., v. Holcomb, 77 F.4th 200 (4th Cir. 2023), overruled a previous circuit precedent, precluding preliminary injunctions from conveying “prevailing party” status to a plaintiff, which in turn precluded awards of attorney’s fees. Under the “American rule,” attorney’s fees are typically not awarded to a prevailing party absent explicit statutory authority. In Smyth ex rel. Smyth v. Rivero, 282 F.3d 268 (4th Cir. 2002), the Fourth Circuit had held that — even when a statute authorized attorney’s fees to a “prevailing party” — a preliminary injunction did not confer “prevailing party” status because of the “interplay of . . . equitable and legal considerations and the less stringent assessment of the merits of claims that are part of the preliminary injunction context.” That categorical ban has now been softened, allowing for recovery of attorney’s fees after obtaining a preliminary injunction in some cases.The plaintiff in Stinnie sued under 42 U.S.C. § 1988(b), which provides that the “prevailing party” is eligible to recover reasonable attorney’s fees. The plaintiff was granted a preliminary injunction, but under Smyth could not receive attorney’s fees based on the injunction alone.Writing for the majority, U.S. Circuit Judge Pamela A. Harris said that Smyth was too strict. “Although many preliminary injunctions represent only ‘a transient victory at the threshold of an action,’ some provide enduring, merits-based relief that satisfies all the requisites of the prevailing party standard,” she wrote. “Because the plaintiffs here ‘prevailed’ in every sense needed to make them eligible for a fee award, we vacate the district court’s denial of attorney’s fees and remand for further proceedings.”The case was decided 7–4, with U.S. Circuit Judge A. Marvin Quattlebaum, Jr. writing a dissent. The majority’s reasoning rested on three considerations. First, the court noted that there is “a broad consensus among other circuits” that a “merits-based p

No appeal was taken of the decision.The Chabad then moved for attorney fees and cost pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1988(b) and sought attorney’s fees in the amount of $1,533,834 and costs in the amount of $106,276.36, for a total award request of $1,640,110.36. The fee request was large as the case had been pending for nearly a decade, producing nine written opinions, one appeal to the Second Circuit Court of Appeals and an appeal to the United States Supreme Court.

After Vice moved for summary judgment on the federal § 1983 claim, Fox admitted the federal claim was not valid. The federal district court remanded the case to state court for further consideration. Vice then asked the federal court to award attorneys’ fees against Fox as permitted under 42 U.S.C. § 1988. Vice argued that Fox’s federal claim was “baseless and without merit.”

479 U.S. 6, 13-14 (1986). In Crest Street, a Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 case, the underlying dispute had been settled, and the Community Council filed a civil action in federal court to recover attorneys’ fees under 42 U.S.C. § 1988(b). The Crest Street Court held that a suit for attorneys’ fees is not an action to enforce any of the civil rights law listed in § 1988, and therefore the federal courts are not authorized to entertain an action under that section solely for attorneys’ fees.

The FactsThe plaintiffs sued the Governor of Georgia for violations of their federal and state constitutional and statutory rights. The parties entered into a consent decree resolving all issues, other than the plaintiffs’ attorney’s fees under federal law (42 U.S.C. § 1988). The plaintiffs submitted a request for more than $14 million in attorney’s fees.

Like the bounty cause of action that S.B. 8 creates against abortion providers or aiders and abettors, the fee-shifting cause of action against federal litigants and their lawyers is transportable to other states and other rights. The right to counsel in civil proceedings is not as prominent as the right to abortion, but it is an important right nonetheless, and federal courts should have the last word on whether states can impede the right through legislation like S.B. 8.1A second basis for pre-emption might be the Texas law’s incompatibility with 42 U.S.C. § 1988, which allows reasonable attorney’s fees to the prevailing party in actions to enforce provisions of the federal civil rights statutes, including 42 U.S.C. § 1983. But § 1988 does not allow recovery of fees from opposing counsel.

Again, the threat was enough to keep Plaintiff from protesting. In October 2008, Plaintiff filed a lawsuit under 42 U.S.C. §1983 against several police officers alleging that they had deprived him of his rights under the First Amendment and seeking damages, injunctive relief, and attorney fees under 42 U.S.C. §1988. On summary judgment, the district court ruled that Defendants did indeed violate Plaintiff’s First Amendments.

I was still running around the schoolyard when this happened, but the Supreme Court in 1975 dropped a bomb on the civil rights community when it ruled in the Alyeska Pipeline case that plaintiffs who win their cases are not entitled to recover attorneys' fees from the losing defendants. This prompted Congress in 1976 to pass the Civil Rights Attorneys' Fees Award Act which allows prevailing parties to recover fees from the defendants in civil rights and other public interest litigation (42 U.S.C. sec. 1988). The courts have been grappling with this legislation ever since.