Source: https://case-law.vlex.com/vid/499-u-s-83-605134354
Timestamp: 2020-04-09 08:54:11
Document Index: 278290817

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 1988', '§ 1988', '§ 1988', '§ 1988', '§ 1988', '§ 1821', '§ 1920', '§ 1821', '§ 1920', '§ 1821', '§ 1920', '§ 1920', '§ 1988', '§ 1988', '§ 2000', '§ 1988', '§ 2618', '§ 2060', '§ 10', '§ 6972']

499 U.S. 83 (1991), 89-994, West Virginia University Hospitals, Inc. v. Casey - Federal Cases - Case Law - VLEX 605134354
Docket Nº: No. 89-994
Citation: 499 U.S. 83, 111 S.Ct. 1138, 113 L.Ed.2d 68, 59 U.S.L.W. 4180
Party Name: West Virginia University Hospitals, Inc. v. Casey
111 S.Ct. 1138, 113 L.Ed.2d 68, 59 U.S.L.W. 4180
Sections 1920 and 1821(b) define the full extent of a federal court's power to shift expert fees, whether testimonial or nontestimonial, absent "explicit statutory authority to the contrary." Crawford Fitting Co. v. J.T. Gibbons Inc., 482 U.S. 437, 439; see id. at 441. This Court will not lightly infer that Congress has repealed those sections through a provision like § 1988 that does not refer explicitly to witness fees. See id. at 445. Pp. 86-87
(d) Where, as here, a statute contains a phrase that is unambiguous, this Court's sole function is to enforce it according to its terms. See, e.g., United States v. Ron Pair Enterprises, Inc., 489 U.S. 235, 241. Although chronology and the remarks of some sponsors of the bill that became § 1988 suggest that it was viewed as a response to Alyeska Pipeline Service Co. v. Wilderness Society, 421 U.S. 240 (1975), the text of
§ 1988 is both broader and narrower than the pre-Alyeska regime. The best evidence of congressional purpose is the statutory text, which cannot be expanded or contracted by the statements of individual legislators or committees during the enactment process. WVUH's argument that Congress would have included expert fees in § 1988 if it had thought about it, as it did in the EAJA, and that this Court has a duty to ask how Congress would have decided had it actually considered the question, profoundly mistakes the Court's role with respect to unambiguous statutory terms. See Iselin v. United States, 270 U.S. 245, 250-251. Pp. 97-101.
[111 S.Ct. 1140] Justice SCALIA delivered the opinion of the Court.
Counsel for WVUH employed Coopers & Lybrand, a national accounting firm, and three doctors specializing in hospital finance to assist in the preparation of the lawsuit and to testify at trial. WVUH prevailed at trial in May, 1988. The District Court subsequently awarded fees pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1988,{ 1} including over $100,000 in fees attributable to expert services. The District Court found these services to have been "essential" to presentation of the case -- a finding not disputed by respondents.
A witness shall be paid an attendance fee of $30 per day for each day's attendance. A witness shall also be paid the attendance fee for the time necessarily occupied in going to and returning from the place of attendance. . . .{ 2}
In Crawford Fitting Co. v. J.T. Gibbons Inc., 482 U.S. 437 (1987), [111 S.Ct. 1141] we held that these provisions define the full extent of a federal court's power to shift litigation costs absent express statutory authority to go further. "[W]hen," we said,
a prevailing party seeks reimbursement for fees paid to its own expert witnesses, a federal court is bound by the limits of § 1821(b), absent contract or explicit statutory authority to the contrary.
not lightly infer that Congress has repealed §§ 1920 and 1821, either through [Fed.Rule Civ.Proc.] 54(d) or any other provision not referring explicitly to witness fees.
As to the testimonial services of the hospital's experts, therefore, Crawford Fitting plainly requires, as prerequisite to reimbursement, the identification of "explicit statutory authority." WVUH argues, however, that some of the expert fees it incurred in this case were unrelated to expert testimony, and that, as to those fees, the § 1821(b) limits, which apply only to witnesses in attendance at trial, are of no consequence. We agree with that, but there remains applicable the limitation of § 1920. Crawford Fitting said that we would not lightly find an implied repeal of § 1821 or of § 1920, which it held to be an express limitation upon the types of costs which, absent other authority, may be shifted by federal courts. 482 U.S. at 441. None of the categories of expenses listed in § 1920 can reasonably be read to include fees for services rendered by an expert employed by a party in a nontestimonial advisory capacity. The question before us, then, is -- with regard to both testimonial and nontestimonial expert fees -- whether the term "attorney's fee" in § 1988 provides the "explicit statutory authority" required by Crawford Fitting.{ 3}
The record of statutory usage demonstrates convincingly that attorney's fees and expert fees are regarded as separate elements of litigation cost. While some fee-shifting provisions, like § 1988, refer only to "attorney's fees," see, e.g., Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-5(k), many others explicitly shift expert witness fees as well as attorney's fees. In 1976, just over a week prior to the enactment of § 1988, Congress passed those provisions of the Toxic Substances Control Act, 15 U.S.C. §§ 2618(d), 2619(c)(2), which provide that a prevailing party may recover "the costs of suit and reasonable fees for attorneys and expert witnesses." (Emphasis added.) Also in 1976, Congress amended the Consumer Product Safety Act, 15 U.S.C. §§ 2060(c), 2072(a), 2073, which as originally enacted in 1972 shifted to the losing party "cost[s] of suit, including a reasonable attorney's fee," see 86 Stat. 1226. In the 1976 amendment, Congress altered the fee shifting provisions to their present form by adding a phrase shifting expert witness fees in addition to attorney's fees. See Pub.L. 94-284, § 10, 90 Stat. 506, 507. Two other significant acts passed in 1976 contain similar phrasing: The Resource Conservation and Recovery Act of 1976, 42 U.S.C. § 6972(e) ("costs of litigation (including reasonable attorney and expert witness...