Title: Daly v. San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors
Citation: N/A
Docket Number: S260209
State: California
Issuer: California Supreme Court
Date: August 9, 2021

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF 
CALIFORNIA 
 
MICHAEL GOMEZ DALY et al., 
Plaintiffs and Respondents, 
v. 
SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF  
SUPERVISORS et al., 
Defendants and Appellants; 
DAWN ROWE, 
Real Party in Interest and Appellant. 
 
S260209 
 
Fourth Appellate District, Division Two 
E073730 
 
San Bernardino County Superior Court 
CIVDS1833846 
 
 
August 9, 2021 
 
Justice Kruger authored the opinion of the Court, in which 
Chief Justice Cantil-Sakauye and Justices Corrigan, Liu, 
Cuéllar, Groban, and Jenkins concurred. 
 
1 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF 
SUPERVISORS 
S260209 
 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
To prevent injuries “from the premature enforcement of a 
determination which may later be found to have been wrong,” 
the law has developed a set of rules and procedures for staying 
enforcement of certain court orders while they are reviewed on 
appeal.  (Scripps-Howard Radio v. Comm’n (1942) 316 U.S. 4, 
9.)  In California, a long-established set of rules governs stays of 
injunctive orders — that is, orders to do something or to refrain 
from doing something.  What rule applies depends on which 
kind of order it is.  An injunction that requires no action and 
merely preserves the status quo (a so-called prohibitory 
injunction) ordinarily takes effect immediately, while an 
injunction requiring the defendant to take affirmative action (a 
so-called mandatory injunction) is automatically stayed during 
the pendency of the appeal. 
In this case we consider how these rules apply to an order 
requiring a local legislative body, the San Bernardino County 
Board of Supervisors, to remove and replace one of its members.  
The order was based on a ruling that the board had violated 
statutory 
open-meeting 
requirements 
in 
making 
an 
appointment to a vacant board seat; as a remedy, the superior 
court required the board to rescind the appointment and to seat 
a replacement board member to be named by the Governor, 
according to the terms of the county charter.  The board filed a 
petition for a writ of supersedeas to stay the effect of the 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
2 
superior court’s order, which the Court of Appeal denied.  We 
now reverse.  The superior court’s order to remove and replace 
the board member was a mandatory injunction — a command 
that the board take affirmative action to remedy the violation 
found by the trial court.  As such, under long-established 
precedent, the order should be stayed until the appellate court 
has determined whether the trial court was correct.   
I. 
The San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors consists 
of five members elected from districts within the county.  The 
county charter provides that within 30 days of a vacancy on the 
board, the remaining members of the board are to appoint a 
replacement by majority vote.  If the board does not fill the 
vacancy within 30 days, the appointment is to be made by the 
Governor.  (San Bernardino County Charter, art. 1, §§ 1, 7, as 
amended through Nov. 6, 2012.) 
The supervisorial seat for San Bernardino County’s Third 
District became vacant on December 3, 2018, when the 
incumbent left to join the California Assembly.  The board’s 
remaining supervisors began the process of appointing a 
replacement.  The board received 48 applications from 
candidates meeting the eligibility requirements.  Rather than 
interviewing all 48 applicants, the supervisors instead decided 
they each would submit nominees to the board’s clerk by e-mail; 
only those candidates who had received at least two nominations 
would be interviewed.  Through this e-mail nomination process, 
the board selected 13 candidates to be interviewed at a public 
meeting.  At that meeting, the board then winnowed the field to 
five finalists, including real party in interest Dawn Rowe.  The 
finalists were to be interviewed again at a special meeting on 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
3 
December 13, at which time the board expected to make the 
appointment. 
Before that special meeting took place, the board received 
a letter from a resident who claimed the e-mail nomination 
process had violated the Ralph M. Brown Act (Brown Act), 
Government Code section 54950 et seq., which generally 
requires local legislative bodies to hold open meetings.  The 
board then deferred further action on the appointment to its 
regular meeting set for December 18, 2018.  Before the 
December 18 meeting, plaintiff Michael Gomez Daly sent the 
board a letter on behalf of the civic organization he directed, 
plaintiff Inland Empire United, also asserting that the board’s 
nomination process had violated Brown Act provisions against 
“seriatim” meetings (that is, a series of closed communications 
or deliberations between members that collectively add up to the 
work of a legislative quorum) and secret ballots.  Daly demanded 
the board adopt a new selection process in which all qualified 
applicants would have the opportunity for an interview.  
At the December 18 meeting, the board took action in 
response to the claims that the e-mail nomination process 
violated the Brown Act.  It voted to rescind its prior actions in 
the selection of a new Third District supervisor, including the 
creation of the list of 13 nominees to be interviewed, and to adopt 
a new process under which each supervisor would publicly 
submit up to three names and the board would publicly 
interview each candidate who received at least one vote.  Using 
that process, the board, at the same meeting, selected six 
candidates to be interviewed, including Rowe.  After the 
interviews, the board selected Rowe, who was then sworn in. 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
4 
Plaintiffs Daly and Inland Empire United promptly filed 
a petition for a writ of mandate, naming as respondents the 
board and the four members who had participated in Rowe’s 
appointment (collectively, the Board), with Rowe as the real 
party in interest.  Plaintiffs sought a judicial determination that 
the initial nomination process violated two provisions of the 
Brown Act:  Government Code section 54952.2, subdivision 
(b)(1), barring the use of seriatim communications in lieu of a 
meeting, and Government Code section 54953, subdivisions (a) 
and (c), requiring local legislative bodies to meet and vote 
openly.  They also sought a determination that the violations 
had not been cured or corrected by the Board’s actions at the 
meeting on December 18, 2018, and that Rowe’s appointment 
was therefore “null and void under [Government Code] section 
54960.1.”  As a remedy, they asked the superior court for an 
order requiring the Board to rescind the appointment and for a 
declaration that, no lawful and timely appointment having been 
made by the Board, the appointment of the Third District 
supervisor “shall be made by the Governor.” 
The superior court granted the mandate petition.  In its 
statement of decision, the court concluded the Board’s initial e-
mail nomination process violated the Brown Act’s “prohibition 
against seriatim meetings and secret ballots.”  The court further 
found the Board’s attempted corrective actions at the December 
18 meeting were “pro forma at best and did not constitute a 
cure.”1  The superior court accordingly determined Rowe’s 
appointment was null and void under Government Code section 
 
1  
The merits of the superior court’s decision on these points 
is not before us, and we express no opinion regarding them. 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
5 
54960.1 and had to be rescinded, with a new appointment to be 
made by the Governor.2   
In its subsequent judgment issuing a peremptory writ of 
mandate, the trial court ordered the Board to:  “1. Rescind the 
appointment of Rowe as Third District Supervisor;  [¶]  
2. Refrain from allowing Rowe to participate as Third District 
Supervisor in any Board meetings or actions;  [¶]  3. Refrain 
from registering or otherwise giving effect to any further votes 
cast by Rowe;  [¶]  4. Refrain from making any appointment to 
the position of Third District Supervisor of the San Bernardino 
Board of Supervisors; and [¶]  5. Immediately seat any person 
duly appointed to the position of Third District Supervisor by 
the Governor.”   
The Board and Rowe appealed.  After obtaining a 
temporary stay of the judgment from the superior court, the 
Board and Rowe petitioned the Court of Appeal for a writ of 
supersedeas and requested an immediate stay.  The Court of 
Appeal issued a temporary stay pending briefing on the 
supersedeas petition, but then denied the stay for the pendency 
of the appeal.  The Court of Appeal opined that the trial court’s 
order was not automatically stayed as a mandatory injunction 
because “upon a finding that [the Board’s] appointment of real 
 
2  
Government Code section 54960.1, subdivision (a), 
provides:  “The district attorney or any interested person may 
commence an action by mandamus or injunction for the purpose 
of obtaining a judicial determination that an action taken by a 
legislative body of a local agency in violation of Section 54953, 
54954.2, 54954.5, 54954.6, 54956, or 54956.5 is null and void 
under this section.  Nothing in this chapter shall be construed 
to prevent a legislative body from curing or correcting an action 
challenged pursuant to this section.” 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
6 
party Dawn Rowe was null and void as arising out of a violation 
of the Brown Act [citation], the seemingly mandatory acts 
required in the superior court’s injunction and writ of mandate 
are merely incidental to that finding and the injunction and writ 
of mandate are prohibitory in nature.  [Citation.]  The same 
finding of a null and void appointment means there was no 
change in status quo by the superior court’s order.”  The court 
also denied a discretionary writ of supersedeas, reasoning that 
the Board and Rowe had neither shown they would be 
irreparably injured by the injunction nor “facially demonstrated 
the merits of the issues they present.”  
The Board and Rowe filed a joint petition for review asking 
whether the superior court’s order should have been 
automatically stayed as a mandatory injunction.  We granted 
the petition for review and stayed the judgment and further 
proceedings below pending our further order.  We also asked the 
parties to brief an additional question bearing on the Board’s 
entitlement to a discretionary writ of supersedeas (Code Civ. 
Proc., § 923); specifically, we asked whether plaintiffs had 
properly brought this action as a petition for writ of mandate 
under the Brown Act’s remedial provision (Gov. Code, § 54960.1, 
subd. (a)) or whether plaintiffs were instead limited to 
challenging the Board’s appointment by means of an action in 
the nature of quo warranto under Code of Civil Procedure 
section 803.  We now conclude the order here should have been 
automatically stayed as a mandatory injunction; we accordingly 
do not address whether a discretionary writ of supersedeas 
should have issued based on the likelihood of the Board’s success 
on the merits of the quo warranto exclusivity issue.   
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
7 
II. 
A. 
The rules governing stays pending appeal are found in 
Code of Civil Procedure part 2, title 13, chapter 2.  The relevant 
statutes codify the common law rule under which an appeal 
ordinarily operates to stay proceedings to execute the trial 
court’s judgment.  (See, e.g., Hovey v. McDonald (1883) 109 U.S. 
150, 157, 160–161.)  The codification of this default rule dates to 
our earliest civil procedure statute, the 1851 Practice Act.  The 
act required undertakings, receiverships, or deposits to stay 
money judgments for orders involving personal or real property 
or execution of instruments.  (Stats. 1851, ch. 5., §§ 349–352, 
pp. 106–107.)  The act went on to provide that in other cases 
(and except for orders directing the sale of perishable property), 
“the perfecting of an appeal, by giving the undertaking . . . , 
shall stay proceedings in the Court below upon the judgment or 
order appealed from . . . .”  (Id., § 356, p. 108.) 
Today, Code of Civil Procedure section 916 continues to 
make stay pending appeal the default, subject to various 
exceptions that are irrelevant here:  “Except as provided in 
Sections 917.1 to 917.9, inclusive, and in Section 116.810, the 
perfecting of an appeal stays proceedings in the trial court upon 
the judgment or order appealed from or upon the matters 
embraced therein or affected thereby, including enforcement of 
the judgment or order, but the trial court may proceed upon any 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
8 
other matter embraced in the action and not affected by the 
judgment or order.”  (Code Civ. Proc., § 916, subd. (a).)3 
Where the statutory conditions have been met and a stay 
on appeal is prescribed, the courts lack discretion to deny it 
except as other statutes may authorize — for instance, a trial or 
appellate court on appeal from a writ of mandate may direct the 
judgment not be stayed “if it is satisfied upon the showing made 
by the petitioner that he will suffer irreparable damage in his 
business or profession if the execution is stayed.”  (Code Civ. 
Proc., § 1110b.) 
Even when the statutes do not call for an automatic stay 
on appeal, the trial and appellate courts both have the power to 
issue discretionary stays.  (Code Civ. Proc., §§ 918, 923.)  A 
discretionary writ of supersedeas is appropriate where “difficult 
questions of law are involved and the fruits of a reversal would 
be irrevocably lost unless the status quo is maintained.”  (People 
ex rel. S. F. Bay etc. Com.  v. Town of Emeryville (1968) 69 Cal.2d 
533, 537; see Deepwell Homeowners’ Protective Assn. v. City 
 
3  
The exceptions described in the first clause cross-reference 
provisions setting out the scope and manner of stays for certain 
types of judgments and orders.  Code of Civil Procedure section 
116.810 relates to small claims court judgments and orders, 
while Code of Civil Procedure sections 917.1 to 917.9 address 
various judgments and orders rendered in the superior courts.  
Section 917.1, for example, requires the appellant to deposit a 
monetary undertaking for a money judgment to be stayed on 
appeal.  Code of Civil Procedure sections 917.2, 917.3 and 917.4 
specify the types of undertakings and deposits required to stay 
judgments and orders directing delivery or sale of personal 
property, execution of an instrument and delivery or sale of 
realty, respectively.   
 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
9 
Council (1965) 239 Cal.App.2d 63, 66 [supersedeas appropriate 
where the appellant has shown sufficient merit in the appeal 
and a stay is necessary “ ‘to preserve to an appellant the fruits 
of a meritorious appeal’ ”].)   
No statute in chapter 2 of the Code of Civil Procedure part 
2, title 13, specifically addresses the stay of injunctive orders, as 
distinct from other kinds of judgments.4  From the start, 
however, courts have understood the default statutory rule 
governing stays pending appeal to apply to some injunctive 
orders but not others, embracing a common law distinction 
between prohibitory, or preventive, injunctions and those 
mandating performance of an affirmative act.  (See generally 2 
High, A Treatise on the Law of Injunctions (4th ed. 1905) 
Appeals, § 1698a, pp. 1647–1648 [describing common law rule]; 
A.R. Barnes & Co. v. Chicago Typographical Union No. 16 
(1908) 232 Ill. 402, 405–409 [83 N.E. 932, 933–935] [same]; Sixth 
Ave. R.R. Co. in City of N.Y. v. Gilbert El. R.R. Co. (1877) 71 N.Y. 
430, 432–434 [no stay of prohibitory injunction].)   
In Merced Mining Co. v. Fremont (1857) 7 Cal. 130 
(Merced Mining), for instance, this court acknowledged that the 
language of the 1851 Practice Act’s section 356 prescribing 
automatic stay pending appeal was facially broad enough to 
include “the appeal from an order granting an injunction.”  But 
 
4  
Certain provisions do prescribe special rules for specific 
types of injunctions, none of which are at issue here.  (See, e.g., 
Code of Civil Procedure sections 917.15 [no default automatic 
stay for order remedying or preventing release of hazardous 
substances], 917.8, subdivision (c) [same for order barring use of 
building or place declared a nuisance], 917.9, subdivision (a)(2) 
[undertaking may be demanded where order requires appellant 
“to perform an act for respondent’s benefit”].) 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
10 
this court concluded that the language was best understood in 
context to reach orders requiring the defendant “to do some 
affirmative act, not to refrain from doing a thing.”  (Merced 
Mining, at p. 132.)  We explained that an affirmative act, “if 
completed, would change the condition of the parties, and render 
a reversal . . . partially ineffectual.”  (Ibid.)  By contrast, when 
an order instead merely restrains the defendant, an automatic 
stay on appeal does not serve the same purpose; the defendant 
“is not injured in contemplation of law” when the defendant is 
required to abide by the restraint pending appeal.  (Ibid.)  We 
thus described the governing rule as follows:  “A stay of 
proceedings, from its nature, only operates upon orders or 
judgments commanding some act to be done, and does not reach 
a case of injunction.”  (Ibid.)5 
We reiterated the same rule some decades later, following 
the adoption of the Code of Civil Procedure.  (Dewey v. Superior 
Court (1889) 81 Cal. 64.)  We explained:  “An appeal perfected 
as this was, under section 949 of the Code of Civil Procedure, 
stayed all proceedings upon every part of that judgment 
‘commanding some act to be done.’  (Merced Mining[, supra], 
7 Cal. 130; Bliss v. Superior Court [(1881)] 62 Cal. [543,] 544.)  
A prohibitory injunction remains in full force pending such an 
appeal, and the court below may enforce obedience thereto; but 
 
5  
The Merced Mining court here used “injunction” in the 
limited sense of an ordered restraint.  That definition is still 
extant in the statutes.  (See Code Civ. Proc., § 525 [“An 
injunction is a writ or order requiring a person to refrain from a 
particular act.”].)  But in broader legal usage, an injunction is a 
court order either “commanding or preventing an action.”  
(Black’s Law Dict. (11th ed. 2019) p. 937, italics added.)  This 
opinion uses the term in the broader, more familiar sense. 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
11 
a mandatory injunction is stayed by the operation of such 
appeal, the object of the rule in both cases being to preserve 
the status quo.”  (Dewey, at p. 68.)6   
As Dewey told the story, the core rationale underlying the 
mandatory-prohibitory distinction was based on an abiding 
concern with preserving the status quo pending appeal.  The 
idea was that a prohibitory injunction is exempt from stay 
because such an injunction, by its nature, operates to preserve 
the status quo; by definition such an injunction prevents the 
defendant from taking actions that would alter the parties’ 
respective provisions.  To stay enforcement of such an order 
pending appeal would not preserve the status quo but instead 
invite its destruction; a stay would leave the parties free to alter 
conditions during the appeal, with sometimes irreversible 
consequences.  As we put it in Heinlen v. Cross (1883) 63 Cal. 
44, if our law had no exception for purely preventive injunctions, 
the appealing party could renew or continue any destructive 
conduct during the period of appeal, even if that would cause 
irreparable damage, while the victorious party below “ ‘must 
stand by, and without possibility of redress, see the subject-
matter of the litigation destroyed, so that if he succeeds in 
affirming the judgment it will be a barren victory.’ ”  (Id. at p. 46, 
quoting Sixth Ave. R.R. Co. in City of N.Y. v. Gilbert El. R.R. Co., 
supra, 71 N.Y. at p. 433; see Heinlen, at p. 46 [“ ‘If the 
respondent here is right in its contention, pending an appeal 
 
6  
Former section 949 of the Code of Civil Procedure, a 
predecessor to section 916, contained terms similar to those in 
section 356 of the 1851 Practice Act.  (See Foster v. Superior 
Court (1896) 115 Cal. 279, 282.) 
 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
12 
from a judgment staying waste, which if committed will destroy 
the freehold, the appellant in simply staying the plaintiff’s 
proceedings on the judgment may with impunity do the very act 
forbidden and destroy the freehold.’ ”].)   
Not so with the injunction that mandates the performance 
of an affirmative act — the so-called mandatory injunction.  
Such an injunction, by definition, commands some change in the 
parties’ positions.  The cases hold that before such orders are 
executed and the defendant must detrimentally alter its 
position, the defendant is entitled to know whether the order is 
correct.  (See, e.g., Kettenhofen v. Superior Court (1961) 55 
Cal.2d 189, 191; Byington v. Superior Court (1939) 14 Cal.2d 68, 
70; United Railroads v. Superior Court (1916) 172 Cal. 80, 82; 
Clute v. Superior Court (1908) 155 Cal. 15, 18; URS Corp. v. 
Atkinson/Walsh Joint Venture (2017) 15 Cal.App.5th 872, 884; 
Paramount Pictures Corp. v. Davis (1964) 228 Cal.App.2d 827, 
835.)   
Like many distinctions in the law, the distinction between 
a mandatory and a prohibitory injunction sometimes proves 
easier to state than to apply.  (URS Corp. v. Atkinson/Walsh 
Joint Venture, supra, 15 Cal.App.5th at p. 884, citing 
Kettenhofen v. Superior Court, supra, 55 Cal.2d at p. 191; see pt. 
III., post.)  But the law contains certain benchmarks that help 
guide the inquiry.  Perhaps the prototypical mandatory 
injunction is an order requiring the defendant to remove an 
improvement it has made to challenged property.  For example, 
“in an action to establish an easement, a preliminary injunction 
ordering a party to remove an existing fence that blocks the 
easement is a mandatory injunction,” while “restraining the 
party from parking or storing vehicles along the easement is a 
prohibitory injunction.”  (URS Corp., at p. 884, citing 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
13 
Kettenhofen, at pp. 190–191.)  But mandatory injunctions in 
property disputes are not limited to tear-down orders.  For 
instance, in Byington v. Superior Court, supra, 14 Cal.2d 68, we 
held that an order limiting San Francisco’s storage of Tuolumne 
River water in Hetch Hetchy Reservoir to the amount of the 
city’s prescriptive right was mandatory rather than prohibitory.  
We explained how the limitation altered the parties’ relative 
positions:  “Throughout the trial of the main action, and up to 
the present moment, the city has contended that in addition to 
the prescriptive right recognized in and awarded to it under the 
decree of the respondent court, it was the owner and possessor 
of certain appropriative rights in and to the waters of the 
Tuolumne River.”  (Id. at p. 72.)  Insofar as the order required 
San Francisco to surrender its appropriative rights, the order 
was mandatory and automatically stayed on appeal.  (Ibid.) 
A substantial body of case law addresses the mandatory-
prohibitory distinction in the context of disputes concerning 
employment, board membership, and the like.  The cases have 
characterized orders requiring officers to surrender their 
positions as mandatory as well.  For example, in Foster v. 
Superior Court, supra, 115 Cal. 279 (Foster), we held an order 
that a particular candidate be recognized as a member of a 
railway company board in place of another competitor who had 
already been seated was mandatory in that its enforcement 
“would change the relative positions of the parties from those 
existing at the time the decree was entered, and might render a 
reversal of the judgment entirely ineffectual.”  (Id. at p. 284.)   
We expanded on this analysis in Clute v. Superior Court, 
supra, 155 Cal. 15 (Clute), which involved an injunction against 
a hotel corporation treasurer and manager who had been 
removed by the board of directors but who refused to vacate the 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
14 
position, claiming the removal was invalid.  On its face the 
injunction merely restrained the officer from attempting to 
direct or control the hotel’s employees.  We concluded that the 
injunction was nonetheless mandatory in substance, and 
therefore automatically stayed on appeal, because it required 
the defendant to undertake the affirmative act of transferring 
management of the hotel.  We wrote:  “If Clute was in the actual 
possession of the hotel and the personal property in it, an order 
punishing him for preventing another person from entering and 
taking charge of the books, keys, and other property could have 
no other purpose or effect than to compel him to turn over his 
possession to such other, or at least to surrender his theretofore 
exclusive possession.”  (Id. at p. 19.)  And “[i]f the injunction 
compels him affirmatively to surrender a position which he 
holds, and which, upon the facts alleged by him, he is entitled to 
hold, it is mandatory.”  (Id. at p. 20.)  In making this 
determination, we explained that the relevant comparison is 
“[t]he status of the parties, at the time the injunction was 
issued”; we observed that an order for Clute to turn over control 
to other claimants “would certainly, if executed, operate to 
change that status.”  (Id. at pp. 19–20.) 
In Feinberg v. One Doe Co. (1939) 14 Cal.2d 24, where a 
clothing manufacturer had been ordered to discontinue 
employment of an individual who had been expelled from the 
labor union representing the company’s employees, we 
explained that although the injunction was purportedly 
prohibitive in form, it was mandatory in substance:  “It is an 
order compelling affirmative action on the part of the 
defendants.  Inasmuch as Amelia Greenwood at the time of the 
issuance of the order was already in the employ of the 
defendants, and the very controversy arose out of the 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
15 
continuance in employment of said Amelia Greenwood, it is 
apparent that the result intended to be accomplished by the 
issuance of said order was the compulsory release of said Amelia 
Greenwood from employment by the defendants.  In short, the 
order directed and commanded the defendants to discharge said 
employee.”  (Id. at p. 27, italics omitted; see also Agricultural 
Labor Relations Bd. v. Superior Court (1983) 149 Cal.App.3d 
709, 713 [order that agricultural employer discontinue 
replacement workers’ employment until all strikers were 
rehired was mandatory under Feinberg because it required 
employer “to take affirmative action by terminating present 
employees”].) 
Similarly, in cases involving contractual duties, the 
Courts of Appeal have deemed injunctions mandatory because 
they required the defendant to act contrary to her contractual 
obligations at the time the order was made, thereby altering the 
status quo.  (Paramount Pictures Corp. v. Davis, supra, 228 
Cal.App.2d at p. 838 [order that actress Bette Davis appear for 
additional filming for Paramount while under contract to 
Aldrich for another film was a mandatory injunction; rather 
than “maintain the status quo as it existed at the time of its 
issuance,” the order “compels defendant to violate her contract 
with Aldrich and to surrender a status and rights lawfully held 
by her at the time the injunction issued”]; Ambrose v. 
Alioto (1944) 62 Cal.App.2d 680, 686 [where defendant had 
contract to deliver fish to one cannery, order that she deliver to 
another was mandatory in that it “contemplates a change in the 
relative position or rights of the parties which existed at the 
time the decree was entered” (italics omitted)]; see also URS 
Corp. v. Atkinson/Walsh Joint Venture, supra, 15 Cal.App.5th 
at p. 884 [order is prohibitory “ ‘if its effect is to leave the parties 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
16 
in the same position as they were prior to the entry of the 
judgment’ ”]; Dosch v. King (1961) 192 Cal.App.2d 800, 804 
[order is mandatory if it “contemplates a change in the relative 
rights of the parties at the time injunction is granted”].)   
In each case, the court considered whether the order was 
mandatory by reference to the position of the parties at the time 
the injunction was entered, and declined to require the 
defendant to take affirmative steps to remedy an adjudged 
violation of law until the correctness of the judgment had been 
considered on appeal.  In the general run of cases, this approach 
makes sense, given the doctrine’s overarching concern with 
avoiding injuries “from the premature enforcement of a 
determination which may later be found to have been wrong.”  
(Scripps-Howard Radio v. Comm’n, supra, 316 U.S. at p. 9.)  If 
the appeal is successful, freezing conditions from the time the 
injunction issues assures that the defendant will get the full 
benefit of his or her success and will not be compelled to take 
remedial steps the law never in fact required; if the appeal is 
unsuccessful, the plaintiff will typically be no worse off than if 
no appeal had been taken.7   
In other cases, however, our cases have suggested a 
different point for measuring change in the parties’ relative 
positions.  We addressed this issue in United Railroads v. 
Superior Court, supra, 172 Cal. 80 (United Railroads).  In that 
case, San Francisco had been operating its municipal street 
railway on facilities owned in part by United Railroads, which 
 
7  
Typically, but not always; in some instances the equities 
might support immediate enforcement of even a mandatory 
injunction, though existing California law prescribes an 
automatic stay.  More on this in part III., post. 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
17 
claimed the city was running more cars than their agreement 
allowed.  (Id. at pp. 81–82.)  United Railroads obtained an 
injunction pendente lite “requiring the defendant to desist and 
refrain from operating this excess number of cars upon the 
tracks and around the loops.”  (Id. at p. 82.)  San Francisco 
appealed, and the question arose whether the injunction was 
automatically stayed pending the appeal as a mandatory 
injunction.  (Ibid.) 
We answered no.  On its face, we noted, the injunction 
“would appear to be an order to defendant to stop doing 
something, not to compel it to do something else, and no more 
mandatory in character than an order telling a man to desist 
from throwing his rubbish in his neighbor’s vacant lot.”  (United 
Railroads, supra, 172 Cal. at p. 84.)  But San Francisco argued 
the injunction was “mandatory in effect” (ibid.) because it 
compelled the city to give up a position held by right, “an interest 
in real property which can be enjoyed only by use, and the 
possession of which can be manifested only by running the cars 
over the tracks” (id at p. 86).  San Francisco urged, that is, that 
maintaining the status quo during the pendency of the litigation 
required allowing the city to continue its disputed usage of the 
tracks. 
We rejected San Francisco’s argument as inconsistent 
with the principle that equity may be invoked to prevent 
repeated trespasses.  (United Railroads, supra, 172 Cal. at 
pp. 86–87.)  We went on to add:  “There is no magic in the phrase 
‘maintaining the status quo’ which transforms an injunction 
essentially prohibitive into an injunction essentially mandatory.  
The phrase is commonly employed in discussing mandatory 
injunctions compelling the surrender of possession of realty by 
the actual peaceable occupant at the time the injunction has 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
18 
been secured.  Indeed, the phrase has been defined to mean ‘the 
last actual peaceable, uncontested status which preceded the 
pending controversy.’  There was no such uncontested 
possession here.  It is undisputed that petitioner protested 
before beginning its action, protested vigorously against the 
misuse of its property, and only brought its action when its 
protests were disregarded.”  (Id. at p. 87.)  We observed, finally, 
that there was no stopping point to San Francisco’s argument:  
“If this be a mandatory injunction, then must every injunction 
restraining waste and trespass be equally mandatory.”  (Id. at 
p. 90.) 
A concurring justice explained the matter succinctly:  “The 
fact that the defendant had for some time been enjoying its 
asserted right to so run cars does not change the character of the 
order.  If this were not so, almost any injunction against the 
doing of repeated acts would be mandatory if the performance of 
the acts had begun and been carried on for any considerable 
time prior to the application for the injunction.”  (United 
Railroads, supra, 172 Cal. at p. 91 (conc. opn. of Sloss, J.).) 
In this discussion, our opinion in United Railroads 
introduced a different baseline for measuring the status quo.  
We explained that the status quo relevant in that case was not 
that prevailing at the time of the injunction — i.e., when San 
Francisco had already begun its disputed use of the tracks and 
sought to keep going — but an earlier “ ‘actual peaceable, 
uncontested status which preceded the pending controversy.’ ”  
(United Railroads, supra, 172 Cal. at p. 87.)  Courts have since 
repeated that formulation in other cases.  (See People v. 
Hill (1977) 66 Cal.App.3d 320, 331 [order restraining defendant 
from using certain allegedly deceptive professional terms in 
business held to preserve the status quo under United Railroads 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
19 
formulation:  “The pleadings clearly indicate a long history of 
appellant’s contested use of the words ‘accountant’ and 
‘accountancy.’  The status quo to be established is that which 
existed before appellant started using the prohibited words”].) 
United Railroads thus naturally raises the question where 
the proper baseline should be fixed.  Should courts measure the 
status quo from the time the order is entered, as Foster, Clute 
and other cases hold, or instead from the “ ‘last actual peaceable, 
uncontested status which preceded the pending controversy’ ” 
(United Railroads, supra, 172 Cal. at p. 87)?   
To answer the question requires us to consider the 
particular circumstance addressed in United Railroads.  Our 
decision in that case recognizes that in some instances, an 
injunction that is essentially prohibitory in nature may involve 
some adjustment of the parties’ respective rights to ensure the 
defendant desists from a pattern of unlawful conduct.  This is 
bound to be true when the defendant attempts to convert its 
contested conduct into something resembling a property right, 
as San Francisco did when it insisted on continuing to run 
excess trains on the plaintiff’s tracks.  The United Railroads 
decision makes clear that an injunction preventing the 
defendant from committing additional violations of the law may 
not be recharacterized as mandatory merely because it requires 
the defendant to abandon a course of repeated conduct as to 
which the defendant asserts a right of some sort.  In such cases, 
the essentially prohibitory character of the order can be seen 
more clearly by measuring the status quo from the time before 
the contested conduct began. 
But United Railroads did not address an order like the 
ones issued in Clute or Paramount Pictures, in which the 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
20 
injunctive order aims not to prevent injury from future conduct 
but instead offers a remedy for a past violation.  To the extent a 
remedial order calls for the performance of an affirmative act — 
ripping out a building or other improvement (Kettenhofen v. 
Superior Court, supra, 55 Cal.2d at pp. 190–191), say, or firing 
one worker and rehiring another (Agricultural Labor Relations 
Bd. v. Superior Court, supra, 149 Cal.App.3d at p. 713) — our 
cases have not understood United Railroads to mean the order 
is merely prohibitory, and therefore enforceable while an appeal 
is pending, because it would return the parties to the “ ‘last 
actual peaceable, uncontested status’ ” that existed before the 
property dispute ever arose.  (United Railroads, supra, 172 Cal. 
at p. 87.)  Our cases have instead adhered to the rule that such 
orders are mandatory, and thus automatically stayed while an 
appellate court determines whether the order is legally correct. 
B. 
With these principles and precedents in mind, we turn to 
the proper characterization of the order in this case. 
On its face, the superior court’s order that the Board 
“[r]escind the appointment of Rowe as Third District 
Supervisor” and “[i]mmediately seat any person duly appointed 
to the position of Third District Supervisor by the Governor” fits 
the description of a mandatory injunction.  Although it is true 
that in some cases an order that appears facially mandatory 
may prove to be prohibitory “in essence and effect” (Kettenhofen 
v. Superior Court, supra, 55 Cal.2d at p. 191), this is not such a 
case.  What the order says on its face is also what it does in 
practice:  namely, require the Board to perform affirmative acts 
that, once performed, will change the relative position of the 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
21 
parties by ousting Rowe from her position so that a replacement 
can be seated.   
Resisting this conclusion, plaintiffs offer a series of 
arguments for characterizing the order as merely prohibitory in 
nature.  They first briefly argue that the facially mandatory 
aspects of the superior court’s judgment — ousting Rowe and 
seating her replacement — were merely incidental to parts of 
the judgment declaring Rowe’s appointment null and void as a 
violation of the Brown Act, barring her from participating in 
Board meetings or actions, and restraining the Board from 
making any other appointment to the position.  Plaintiffs’ 
argument draws on our observation in United Railroads, supra, 
172 Cal. at page 88, that “the character of a prohibitive 
injunction [is] not transformed and made mandatory because it 
incidentally involved the doing of an affirmative act.”  The 
observation in United Railroads remains true, as far as it goes.  
For example, an order prohibiting a defendant from using a 
particular trade name might incidentally require the defendant 
to remove the name from its signage; the incidental steps 
required to take the trade name out of circulation does not 
convert what is essentially a prohibitory injunction into a 
mandatory one.  (See Jaynes v. Weickman (1921) 51 Cal.App. 
696, 699–700; see also People v. Mobile Magic Sales, Inc. (1979) 
96 Cal.App.3d 1, 5 [defendant was ordered to refrain from 
displaying mobilehome models for sale at a mobilehome park; 
requiring the defendant to remove the mobilehomes currently 
on display did not render the injunction mandatory].)  But here, 
the requirement to remove Rowe from the Third District 
supervisor position and seat the Governor’s replacement cannot 
plausibly be described as merely incidental to other aspects of 
the order; it was not a necessary means to a prohibitory end, but 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
22 
the end in itself.8  Under the circumstances, any prohibitory 
elements in the order might better be described as incidental to 
the mandatory, rather than vice versa.9 
Plaintiffs’ second and more central contention is that 
rescission of Rowe’s appointment merely returns the parties to 
the positions they occupied before the Board engaged in the 
challenged appointment process, consistent with the teaching of 
United Railroads.  Of course, a true return to precontroversy 
conditions presumably would leave the Board free to make a 
new appointment rather than being compelled to accept a 
replacement named by the Governor.  But even setting that 
point aside, we reject plaintiffs’ argument as inconsistent with 
California law concerning stays of injunction pending appeal.  
As we have explained, United Railroads addressed 
situations in which the injunction being appealed restrains the 
defendant 
from 
repeating 
its 
unlawful 
conduct, while 
simultaneously requiring some adjustment of the parties’ 
 
8  
To the extent plaintiffs attempt to characterize these 
mandatory orders as incidental in the sense that they merely 
implemented the court’s finding that the Board’s appointment 
of Rowe was null and void, the argument proves too much.  In 
that sense, virtually every remedial order could be characterized 
as incidental to the underlying legal violation on which it is 
based. 
9  
We note as well that Rowe’s removal is clearly not 
incidental in any sense to plaintiffs, who asked the superior 
court not only to declare the appointment void but to order it 
rescinded and the Governor’s appointee seated.  In this court, 
moreover, plaintiffs have made clear that one of their central 
concerns is whether Rowe would be permitted to continue 
occupying the seat, and thus claim incumbent status on the 
ballot in the Third District supervisor election, despite the 
alleged defect in the process that led to her appointment. 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
23 
respective rights, such as an abridgment of the defendant’s 
claimed property right in continuing its challenged conduct.  
(See pt. II.A., ante; United Railroads, supra, 172 Cal. at p. 91 
(conc. opn. of Sloss, J.); accord, Jaynes v. Weickman, supra, 51 
Cal.App. at p. 699 [citing United Railroads for the proposition 
that “[a]n injunction that restrains the continuance of an act or 
series of acts may be just as much a preventive or prohibitory 
injunction as one that restrains the commission of an act”].)  
That is not the situation here.  The order on appeal here 
required the Board not to refrain from repeating its Brown Act 
violation, but rather to take affirmative action to undo the 
violation’s effect, that is, to rescind Rowe’s appointment and to 
seat another in her place.   
Like other injunctions our courts have deemed mandatory, 
the order that the Board replace Rowe with a gubernatorial 
appointment goes beyond restraint to demand affirmative acts, 
changing the status quo at the time the injunction was issued.  
In Foster, supra, 115 Cal. at page 281, for example, the trial 
court found one candidate, Smith, to have been elected to a 
corporate board and ordered the board president not to interfere 
with his exercise of the office.  We held that the order, 
“[a]lthough preventive in form, . . . was, in effect, mandatory, as 
it required [the president] and the other directors to recognize 
Smith as one of their number, and to refuse to recognize [a 
competing candidate],” thereby “chang[ing] the relative 
positions of the parties from those existing at the time the decree 
was entered.”  (Id. at p. 284.)  The order in Foster, like the one 
in this case, required the defendants to refuse their approved 
candidate and instead accept a different individual (in this case, 
the Governor’s appointee).  The order was found to be 
mandatory because it did not restrain the defendants from 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
24 
repeating their violation but instead mandated that they take 
affirmative action — seating a different candidate — to undo a 
past act found to be unlawful.  (See also Ambrose v. Alioto, 
supra, 62 Cal.App.2d at p. 686 [order that catch be delivered to 
one cannery rather than another “compels the performance of a 
substantive act”].)  
The United Railroads defendant proposed using the 
preservation of the precontroversy status quo as a basis to 
“transform[] an injunction essentially prohibitive into an 
injunction essentially mandatory,” a proposal we there rejected.  
(United Railroads, supra, 172 Cal. at p. 87.)  Here, plaintiffs 
invoke United Railroads with precisely the opposite aim.  If 
United Railroads were understood as plaintiffs suggest, then 
the decision would all but negate the basic rule to which 
California courts, applying statutory law, have adhered since 
1857:  that the defendant’s perfection of an appeal results in the 
stay of a mandatory injunction against the defendant.    
A brief review of the mandatory injunction cases will 
suffice to demonstrate the point.  In Byington v. Superior Court, 
supra, 14 Cal.2d 68, for example, where San Francisco had been 
ordered not to take Tuolumne River water above the amount of 
its prescriptive right, and had violated that order by taking 
additional water to fill an enlarged Hetch Hetchy Reservoir, we 
held the order a mandatory injunction because it required the 
city to surrender a property right (an appropriative water right) 
it allegedly held at the time the order was made.  (Id. at pp. 69–
70, 72–73.)  If we had instead concluded that the status quo were 
properly measured by reference to conditions preceding the 
controversial acts that gave rise to the litigation, then we should 
instead have deemed the order prohibitory, as it merely 
returned the parties to their positions before San Francisco 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
25 
began storing the extra water, and allowed it to take effect 
pending the decision on appeal.10 
 
10  
We acknowledge that the proper characterization of the 
injunction at issue in Byington is not free from ambiguity.  
Rather than view the trial court’s order there as requiring the 
affirmative abandonment of a property right, we might with 
equal plausibility have characterized it as restraining San 
Francisco from repeating its allegedly unlawful conduct of 
storing excess water — much as the city in United Railroads 
had been ordered to stop running excess trains on the plaintiff’s 
tracks.  That we did not characterize the injunction that way 
may have had something to do with the fact that the city had 
prevailed on the merits in an intervening decision on appeal.  
(See Byington v. Superior Court, supra, 14 Cal.2d at pp. 72–73; 
see Meridian, Ltd., v. San Francisco (1939) 13 Cal.2d 424, 459–
460 [modifying the trial court’s order].)   
 
Byington is not the sole example of this type of ambiguity.  
In Clute, for example, we might plausibly have characterized the 
injunction as merely restraining the defendant from continuing 
to act unlawfully as manager and treasurer of the hotel, rather 
than as ousting the defendant from a possessory interest in the 
hotel and its associated personal property.  (Clute, supra, 155 
Cal. at pp. 17, 19–20.) 
 
We mention these ambiguities not to suggest that either 
of these decisions was wrongly decided, but only to illustrate the 
difficulties 
of 
application 
inherent 
in 
our 
traditional 
mandatory/prohibitory distinction, difficulties that contribute to 
our belief this area of the law may be ripe for reconsideration or 
legislative reform.  (See pt. III., post.) 
The point remains, however, that the outcome in Byington 
would certainly have been different had we understood the 
question before us solely in terms of whether the injunction 
returned the parties to the last actual, peaceable status 
preceding the controversy, as opposed to asking more broadly 
whether the injunction effectively preserved the status quo 
pending appeal. 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
26 
Similarly, in Paramount Pictures Corp. v. Davis, supra, 
228 Cal.App.2d 827, the appellate court held a preliminary 
injunction ordering Bette Davis to return to the Paramount 
studios and perform an additional day’s filming on one movie 
(Where Love Has Gone) — at a time when Davis was already 
engaged in filming another movie (Hush, Hush Sweet Charlotte) 
for another company — was mandatory rather than prohibitory 
because it commanded Davis to take affirmative action.  (Id. at 
p. 838.)  Had the court decided to answer this question based 
solely on whether an additional day’s worth of Where Love Has 
Gone filming would return the parties to the state of affairs that 
existed before Davis signed her conflicting contract with the 
other movie studio, the court surely would have reached a 
different result. 
Or to take one final example, consider an order directing 
an employer to fire replacement workers and rehire strikers.  
(Agricultural Labor Relations Bd. v. Superior Court, supra, 149 
Cal.App.3d at p. 713.)  The Court of Appeal labeled the order 
mandatory, and therefore automatically stayed on appeal, 
because it commanded the employer to take affirmative steps to 
remedy an alleged legal violation.  Again, if the question were 
instead merely whether the order restored the status quo 
preceding the challenged acts, the answer would have been 
different; 
the 
injunction 
would 
have 
been 
considered 
prohibitory, and the employer would have been required to take 
affirmative steps to remedy an alleged violation before the 
appellate court had determined whether there was a violation 
to remedy.   
California law has long taken a different approach to such 
matters, under which the usual default rule of stay pending 
appeal extends to mandatory orders requiring the defendant to 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
27 
undertake an affirmative act.  Our decision in United Railroads 
was not meant to, and did not, upend this settled law.  In the 
cases cited above, the injunction was essentially mandatory in 
that it commanded the performance of affirmative acts to 
remedy a violation while the legal basis for that remedy was still 
subject to appellate review.  So too here. 
Plaintiffs next argue that because Rowe’s appointment 
was declared void by the superior court, she never lawfully held 
the seat, and the order that her appointment be rescinded made 
no change to the status quo.  We rejected a similar argument in 
Clute.  The corporation that owned the hotel argued it “was at 
all times entitled to the possession and in the actual possession 
of the hotel and its contents, and a surrender of the custody by 
one employee to another authorized to receive it leaves the 
status of the property, so far as possession is concerned, 
unaltered.”  (Clute, supra, 155 Cal. at p. 19.)  But that argument, 
we explained, “fails to take into account the very point that was 
in dispute in the court below,” that is, the propriety of Clute’s 
ouster as manager.  (Ibid.)  Plaintiffs’ argument similarly 
ignores that the central points in dispute in the superior court 
and on appeal concern the validity of Rowe’s appointment and 
the superior court’s power to nullify it in this action.  The goal 
of a stay is to preserve the status quo while a court determines 
the merits of the appeal; issuance of the stay cannot depend on 
the assumption that the appeal will fail. 
Finally, plaintiffs worry that automatically staying orders 
that require the defendant to unwind the effects of a Brown Act 
violation, like the order at issue in this case, will “undermine the 
Brown Act’s force by permitting violating agencies to enjoy the 
fruits of their violations during the pendency of any appeal.”  
The worry is misplaced.  For one thing, our holding here states 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
28 
no general rule as to the stay of orders remedying violations of 
the Brown Act; we here have considered only one order 
prescribing one particular set of remedies for an alleged 
violation involving a challenge to the legitimacy of a public 
official’s claim to office.  That order, as we have seen, centrally 
included commands for affirmative acts, going well beyond 
preventing the Board from “enjoy[ing] the fruits” of the 
violation.  But even as to orders removing a public officer 
because of a Brown Act violation, plaintiffs’ concerns are 
overstated.  Code of Civil Procedure section 803, which 
implements the common law writ of quo warranto in California, 
authorizes the Attorney General or a relator acting with that 
officer’s consent to seek the ouster of a person unlawfully 
holding office.  In general, this procedure is the exclusive means 
to try the title of a person occupying a public office (see Stout v. 
Democratic County Central Com. (1952) 40 Cal.2d 91, 93; 
Nicolopulos v. City of Lawndale (2001) 91 Cal.App.4th 1221, 
1225).  And when judgment is rendered in favor of the 
challengers, the judgment is not subject to automatic stay on 
appeal.  (Code Civ. Proc., § 917.8, subd. (a).) 
The parties vigorously dispute whether quo warranto was 
the exclusive remedy available here.  But even if it was not the 
exclusive remedy, it was at least an available remedy.  (See Hills 
for Everyone v. Local Agency Formation Com. (1980) 105 
Cal.App.3d 461, 470 [“The availability of other statutory 
remedies ordinarily does not foreclose a proceeding in the nature 
of 
quo 
warranto 
by 
the 
Attorney 
General.”]; 
cf. 
97 
Ops.Cal.Atty.Gen. 12 (2014) [2014 WL 1218410, p.*6] [where 
quo warranto action was authorized by Attorney General on 
other grounds, Brown Act claim may also be resolved in the 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
29 
action].)11  Had plaintiffs proceeded by quo warranto and 
prevailed on the merits, they would have obtained an 
immediately enforceable judgment that Rowe “be excluded from 
the office.”  (Code Civ. Proc., § 809.)  They did not proceed by quo 
warranto, however, and so enforcement of the superior court’s 
order must await review of the judgment on appeal.   
III. 
We have concluded that under the settled law of 
California, the order in this case was automatically stayed as a 
mandatory injunction.  Neither party has asked us to eliminate 
or revise the automatic stay rule governing injunctions — or the 
automatic stay rule more generally, for that matter.  And given 
the rule’s long tenure in our jurisprudence and its statutory 
roots (first in § 356 of the 1851 Practice Act, then in Code Civ. 
Proc., former § 949, and currently in Code Civ. Proc., § 916), the 
scope of our authority to do so absent statutory amendment is 
uncertain.  (Cf. Agricultural Labor Relations Bd. v. Superior 
Court, supra, 149 Cal.App.3d at pp. 716–717 [Code Civ. Proc., 
§ 916 applies to a mandatory injunction notwithstanding 
absence of reference to it in statute authorizing the injunction; 
Legislature was presumably aware of California’s long-standing 
automatic stay rule when enacting statute providing for 
 
11  
As stated earlier, we need not decide here whether 
Government Code section 54960.1, by specifying a mandamus 
remedy for violations of the Brown Act, creates an exception to 
the rule of quo warranto exclusivity.  We also do not address 
here whether an action under Code of Civil Procedure section 
803 based on a Brown Act violation would need to meet any of 
the procedural prerequisites of a mandate petition brought 
under 
Government 
Code 
section 
54960.1, 
or 
whether 
proceedings under the two statutes might be consolidated or 
coordinated. 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
30 
injunctive relief].)  We nevertheless pause briefly here to reflect 
on this area of our procedural law, which we have not addressed 
in many years, and to suggest an area that may be ripe for 
reexamination. 
As noted earlier, our cases have long recognized that the 
mandatory-prohibitory distinction can prove challenging to 
apply.  It is not always easy to distinguish a restraint from a 
command, or vice versa.  There are no magic words that will 
distinguish the one from the other; the cases recognize that “ ‘an 
order entirely negative or prohibitory in form may prove upon 
analysis to be mandatory and affirmative in essence and 
effect.’ ”  (URS Corp. v. Atkinson/Walsh Joint Venture, supra, 
15 Cal.App.5th at p. 884, quoting Kettenhofen v. Superior Court, 
supra, 55 Cal.2d at p. 191.)  And in some cases, the injunction 
will plausibly be characterized as involving both restraint and 
command.  The same order may, for example, be characterized 
as simply prohibiting the defendant from repeating conduct the 
trial court has found unlawful, or as mandating that the 
defendant act affirmatively to surrender a right or a position 
occupied under a claim of right.  (See fn. 10, ante.)   
But 
problems 
of 
characterization 
aside, 
the 
mandatory/prohibitory distinction also appears imperfectly 
aligned with the equitable considerations relevant to the 
question of staying an order pending appeal.  (See People ex rel. 
S. F. Bay etc. Com. v. Town of Emeryville, supra, 69 Cal.2d at 
p. 537 [courts seek to do “justice” in issuing stays pending 
appeal, considering “the relative hardships on the parties” and 
“the likelihood that substantial questions will be raised on 
appeal”].)  There is reason to doubt a strict application of the 
rule automatically staying mandatory injunctions will produce 
the most just result in all cases.  Because an appeal can take a 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
31 
substantial time to resolve, and because during that time the 
plaintiff may, in some cases, be significantly injured by the 
maintenance of the status quo, an automatic stay will not 
always be fair to prevailing plaintiffs with strong cases that are 
likely to be upheld on appeal.12  A more flexible approach that 
permitted the trial and appellate courts to weigh the likelihood 
of each party’s success on appeal and the extent of irreparable 
injury each will suffer from the stay decision would allow courts 
to make more sensitive, case-specific judgments about whether 
the equities favor the stay of an injunctive order pending appeal. 
Many 
jurisdictions 
provide 
courts 
with 
equitable 
discretion of this nature.  Federal courts employ a four-part 
analysis that considers the likelihood of success on the merits as 
well as the types and extent of injuries, private and public, that 
may result from either course (stay or no stay).  (Hilton v. 
Braunskill (1987) 481 U.S. 770, 776.)13  New York law 
 
12  
See Lee, Preliminary Injunctions and the Status 
Quo (2001) 58 Wash. & Lee L.Rev. 109, 161 (noting, in the 
related area of rules governing issuance of preliminary 
injunctions, that “it may be that injunctions preserving the 
status quo are more likely to minimize irreparable harm, while 
injunctions upsetting the status quo tend to multiply such 
harms.  But clearly there are exceptions to this ‘rule’ ”).  Our 
general observation should not, of course, be taken as a 
reflection on the equities of the present case. 
13  
“Different Rules of Procedure govern the power of district 
courts and courts of appeals to stay an order pending appeal.  
See Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 62(c); Fed. Rule App. Proc. 8(a).  Under 
both Rules, however, the factors regulating the issuance of a 
stay are generally the same:  (1) whether the stay applicant has 
made a strong showing that he is likely to succeed on the merits; 
(2) whether the applicant will be irreparably injured absent a 
 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
32 
establishes a set of presumptions favoring stays on appeal but 
allows courts the discretion to refuse or limit them in individual 
cases.  (N.Y. C.P.L.R. § 5519.)14  Oregon law employs a test for 
discretionary trial court stays similar to the federal test (Or. 
Rev. Stat. Ann. § 19.350(3)) and allows the appellate courts to 
vacate or modify stays issued by the trial courts as well as to 
issue their own stays.  (Id., § 19.360(4).)  New Jersey case law 
holds that in order to obtain a stay pending appeal of a trial 
court’s order, the moving party “must demonstrate that (1) relief 
is needed to prevent irreparable harm; (2) the applicant’s claim 
rests on settled law and has a reasonable probability of 
succeeding on the merits; and (3) balancing the ‘relative 
hardships to the parties reveals that greater harm would occur 
if a stay is not granted than if it were.’ ”  (Garden State Equality 
v. Dow (2013) 216 N.J. 314, 320.)  In Washington, similarly, 
“[w]hether a stay pending appeal should be granted depends on 
(1) whether the issue presented by the appeal is debatable, and 
(2) whether a stay is necessary to preserve for the movant the 
 
stay; (3) whether issuance of the stay will substantially injure 
the other parties interested in the proceeding; and (4) where the 
public interest lies.”  (Hilton v. Braunskill, supra, 481 U.S. at 
p. 776.) 
14  
New York continues to follow the rule that mandatory 
injunctions fall within the automatic stay provisions, while 
prohibitory injunctions are considered self-executing, serve to 
maintain the status quo, and therefore are not automatically 
stayed.  (State of New York v. Town of Haverstraw (N.Y.App.Div. 
1996) 219 A.D.2d 64, 65.)  But unlike California, New York 
empowers the appellate court to “vacate, limit or modify any 
stay” imposed under the statute’s automatic provisions, 
including stays of mandatory injunctions.  (N.Y. C.P.L.R. 
§ 5519(c).) 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
33 
fruits of a successful appeal, considering the equities of the 
situation.”  (Purser v. Rahm (1985) 104 Wash.2d 159, 177.) 
In contrast, California statutes provide both trial and 
appellate courts general discretion (subject to certain statutory 
limits) to stay orders, including injunctions (Code Civ. Proc., 
§§ 918, 923), but do not appear to authorize the general exercise 
of equitable discretion to countermand or modify the stay of an 
injunction imposed automatically under Code of Civil Procedure 
section 916.15  (An exception, noted earlier, is Code of Civil 
Procedure section 1110b, which authorizes a court to leave a 
writ of mandate unstayed when the stay would cause the 
plaintiff “irreparable damage in his business or profession.”)  In 
cases where the trial court’s order has not automatically been 
stayed, California appellate courts engage in a balancing of the 
equities in deciding whether to issue a writ of supersedeas 
pursuant to Code of Civil Procedure section 923.  (People ex rel. 
S. F. Bay etc. Com. v. Town of Emeryville, supra, 69 Cal.2d at 
p. 537; Eisenberg et al., Cal. Practice Guide:  Civil Appeals and 
Writs (The Rutter Group 2020) ¶¶ 7:279 to 7:281, pp. 7-79 to 7-
80.)  Given the essentially equitable nature of the stay pending 
 
15  
Some courts have suggested the provision of Code of Civil 
Procedure section 923 authorizing an appellate court to “make 
any order appropriate to preserve . . . the effectiveness of the 
judgment subsequently to be entered” might empower the 
appellate court to vacate or modify a stay of the trial court’s 
order in some circumstances.  (See Agricultural Labor Relations 
Bd. v. Superior Court, supra, 149 Cal.App.3d at p. 719 
[suggesting Code Civ. Proc., § 923 might be employed in this 
manner “to prevent final ALRB actions from being mooted by 
events”].)  Limited as it is to orders aimed at preserving the 
effectiveness of the court’s judgment, however, that clause has 
not been construed as a general warrant for undoing automatic 
stays of mandatory injunctions on equitable grounds. 
DALY v. SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS 
Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 
 
34 
appeal, it would seem to make sense for both trial and appellate 
courts to have the same authority to order, when justice 
demands it, that a mandatory injunction take effect 
notwithstanding the filing of an appeal from the injunctive 
order.  This issue is beyond the scope of the questions presented 
and briefed in this case for our review, so we do not answer it 
here.  But the Legislature may always, if it chooses, reexamine 
California’s statutory law governing stays pending appeal and 
decide whether the law would be better served by an approach 
that permits courts to take account of a wider array of equitable 
considerations than does present law. 
IV. 
The superior court’s order requiring the Board to rescind 
its appointment of Rowe as a supervisor and to instead seat an 
appointee named by the Governor was subject to an automatic 
stay of enforcement pending the Board and Rowe’s appeal on the 
merits.  (Code Civ. Proc., § 916, subd. (a).)  The Board and Rowe 
were entitled to a writ of supersedeas effectuating such a stay.  
We therefore reverse the Court of Appeal’s order denying the 
writ and remand for further proceedings consistent with our 
opinion.  The stay of proceedings previously issued by this court 
is dissolved. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
   KRUGER, J. 
 
We Concur: 
CANTIL-SAKAUYE, C. J. 
CORRIGAN, J. 
LIU, J. 
CUÉLLAR, J. 
GROBAN, J. 
JENKINS, J.
 
 
See next page for addresses and telephone numbers for counsel who 
argued in Supreme Court. 
 
Name of Opinion  Daly v. San Bernardino County Board of 
Supervisors  
__________________________________________________________  
 
Procedural Posture (see XX below) 
Original Appeal  
Original Proceeding 
Review Granted (published)  
Review Granted (unpublished) XX NP order filed 1/8/20 – 4th 
Dist., Div. 2 
Rehearing Granted 
 
__________________________________________________________  
 
Opinion No. S260209 
Date Filed: August 9, 2021 
__________________________________________________________  
 
Court:  Superior  
County: San Bernardino  
Judge: Janet M. Frangie  
 
__________________________________________________________   
 
Counsel: 
 
Meyers, Nave, Riback, Silver & Wilson, Deborah J. Fox, T. Steven 
Burke, Jr., Matthew B. Nazareth; Michelle D. Blakemore, County 
Counsel, and Penny Alexander-Kelley, Chief Assistant County 
Counsel, for Defendants and Appellants and for Real Party in Interest 
and Appellant. 
 
McDermott Will & Emery, William P. Donovan, Jr., and Jason D. 
Strabo for Real Party in Interest and Appellant.   
 
Jarvis, Fay & Gibson, Alexandra Barnhill and Gabriel McWhirter for 
League of California Cities as Amicus Curiae on behalf of Defendants 
and Appellants and for Real Party in Interest and Appellant. 
 
 
 
James R. Williams, County Counsel (Santa Clara), Karun Tilak and 
Stephanie L. Safdi, Deputy County Counsel, for California State 
Association of Counties as Amicus Curiae on behalf of Defendants and 
Appellants and for Real Party in Interest and Appellant. 
 
Altshuler Berzon, Stacey Leyton, Hunter B. Thomson; Rothner, Segall 
& Greenstone, Glenn Rothner and Juhyung Harold Lee for Plaintiffs 
and Respondents. 
 
David Snyder, Glen Smith; Davis Wright Tremaine and Thomas R. 
Burke for First Amendment Coalition as Amicus Curiae on behalf of 
Plaintiffs and Respondents. 
 
 
 
 
Counsel who argued in Supreme Court (not intended for 
publication with opinion): 
 
Deborah J. Fox 
Meyers, Nave, Riback, Silver & Wilson 
707 Wilshire Boulevard, 24th Floor 
Los Angeles, CA 90017 
(213) 626-2906 
 
Glenn Rothner 
Rothner, Segall & Greenstone 
510 South Marengo Avenue 
Pasadena, CA 91101 
(626) 796-7555