Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/20pdf/19-968_8nj9.pdf
Page Number: 22.0

6 

UZUEGBUNAM v. PRECZEWSKI 

ROBERTS, C. J., dissenting 

petitioners  in  this  case  no  longer  seek  prospective  relief. 
Although  they  initially  asked  for  a  declaratory  judgment 
and  a  preliminary  injunction,  they  abandoned  those  re-
quests once the college rescinded the challenged policies.

The Court is correct to note that plaintiffs at common law 
often received nominal damages for past violations of their 
rights.  Those awards, however, were generally limited to 
situations in which prevailing plaintiffs tried and failed to 
prove actual damages.  See 1 D.  Dobbs, Law  of Remedies 
§3.3(2),  p. 296  (2d  ed.  1993)  (describing  nominal  damages
awards  as  “a  rescue  operation”).  Notwithstanding  the
Court’s protestations to the contrary, nominal damages in
such  cases  were  in  fact  a  “consolation  prize,”  ante,  at  9, 
awarded as a hook to allow prevailing plaintiffs to at least
recover attorney’s fees and costs.  See W. Hale, Handbook 
on the Law of Damages 30–31 (1896) (“The importance of 
the right to recover nominal damages often consists in its 
effect on costs.”); 1 T. Sedgwick, Measure of Damages §96,
p. 164 (9th ed. 1912) (“[T]hey are a mere peg to hang costs 
on.” (internal quotation marks omitted)).  The petitioners in
this case have asked to recover their fees and costs, but they
never sought actual damages, so the common law provides 
little relevant support.

On  this  last  point,  the  Court  acknowledges  in  several
places that the historical record is mixed as to whether legal
violations were actionable at all without a showing of com-
pensable harm.  See ante, at 5, 7.  And the Court does not 
cite any case in which plaintiffs sought only nominal dam-
ages  for  purely  retrospective  injuries.    The  Court  instead 
relies  on  several  decisions  that  contained  live  damages
claims, see Barker v. Green, 2 Bing. 317, 130 Eng. Rep. 327
(C. P.  1824)  (“actual  damage  was  the  gist  of  the  action”); 
Hatch v. Lewis, 2 F. & F. 467, 469, 175 Eng. Rep. 1145, 1146
(N. P.  1861)  (defendants’  ineffective  assistance  allegedly 
caused  plaintiff  to  be  “deprived  of  the  profits  and  emolu-
ments he might otherwise have obtained”); Dods v. Evans,