Opinion ID: 1134428
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: 2. The recently enacted provisions of section 1021.5 of the Code of Civil Procedure, authorizing awards of attorney fees under a private attorney general theory, apply to this case and to all other cases pending on appeal on the effective date of the statute.

Text: As noted above, at the time the trial court denied plaintiffs' request for attorney fees under a private attorney general theory, neither statutory nor decisional authority in this state explicitly sanctioned an attorney fee award on such a basis. In D'Amico v. Board of Medical Examiners (1974) 11 Cal.3d 1, 27 [112 Cal. Rptr. 786, 520 P.2d 10], decided a little more than a year prior to the trial court's ruling, our court briefly adverted to a number of federal decisions which had embraced the private attorney general concept as a basis for an attorney fee award, but in that decision we expressly declined to consider the doctrine's possible application in California pending an announcement by the [United States Supreme Court] concerning its limits and contours on the federal level. ( Id. ) In May 1975, just three months prior to the trial court's denial of plaintiff's attorney fee request, the United States Supreme Court rendered its decision in Alyeska Pipeline Co. v. Wilderness Society (1975) 421 U.S. 240 [44 L.Ed.2d 141, 95 S.Ct. 1612], holding that, in the absence of statutory authorization, federal courts under federal law could not properly award attorney fees on a private attorney general theory. The Alyeska court reasoned that Congress, in providing statutory attorney fee provisions to encourage private enforcement in some circumstances, and in omitting similar provisions in other contexts, had made an implicit legislative determination as to which statutory policies warranted such encouragement; the majority in Alyeska concluded that under these circumstances the judiciary would be improperly intruding into the legislative domain if courts were to determine which of the many statutory remedies that lacked explicit attorney fee provisions should be supplemented by an attorney fee award. (421 U.S. at pp. 260-269 [44 L.Ed.2d at pp. 154-160].) In light of D'Amico and Alyeska, and in the absence of any subsequent California judicial pronouncement or statutory enactment, the trial court in the instant case concluded that plaintiffs were not entitled to an attorney fee award on a private attorney general theory. Subsequent to the trial court's ruling, and while the present case was pending on appeal, the question whether California courts enjoy inherent equitable authority to award attorney fees pursuant to a private attorney general theory came before our court in Serrano III. In Serrano III, the trial court, relying on the private attorney general rationale, had entered an order against various state officials awarding substantial legal fees ($800,000) to two public interest law firms that had successfully prosecuted the landmark Serrano litigation. [4] The state officials appealed the attorney fee award, urging our court to adopt the Alyeska conclusion and thereby reject in its entirety the private attorney general theory as a basis for a nonstatutory award of attorney fees. In Serrano III, however, we declined to follow the Alyeska court's broad holding and concluded that, under the facts of that case, the trial court had properly exercised its equitable authority in awarding attorney fees on a private attorney general theory. In reaching that conclusion, we pointed out that the principal concern of the Alyeska court  i.e., that the application of the private attorney general doctrine would improperly thrust the judiciary into picking and choosing, without legislative warrant, which statutes should be supplemented by an attorney fee award and which should not  was not present in the Serrano litigation for in that case the plaintiffs had not vindicated a public policy grounded in statute, but one grounded in the state Constitution. (Original italics.) (20 Cal.3d at p. 46.) In light of the constitutional nature of the rights at issue in Serrano, we reasoned that the absence of an explicit statutory attorney fee provision could not realistically be viewed as a legislative determination that the enforcement of such rights did not warrant the encouragement provided by the availability of an attorney fee award. (20 Cal.3d at pp. 46-47.) Thus, we concluded in Serrano III that when a litigant has successfully vindicated a right of constitutional dimension and has provided benefits to a large group of persons under circumstances in which subsidization of attorney fees is necessary if enforcement of the right is to be achieved, a trial court in California possesses inherent equitable power to award attorney fees on a private attorney general theory. (20 Cal.3d at p. 47.) In so holding, we expressly left open the question whether the inherent equitable authority enjoyed by California courts is sufficiently expansive that courts may award attorney fees under the `private attorney general' theory, where the litigation at hand has vindicated a public policy having a statutory, as opposed to, a constitutional basis. ( Id. ) We need not reach the question of the scope of the judiciary's nonstatutory equitable authority in the instant case, however, because, as already noted, while the present case was pending on appeal the Legislature enacted section 1021.5 of the Code of Civil Procedure. The section provides explicit statutory authorization for a private attorney general attorney fee award without regard to whether the public policy vindicated rests upon Constitution or statute. Although section 1021.5 was not on the books at the time the trial court denied plaintiffs' motion for attorney fees, the governing authorities establish that the new statute nonetheless applies to this proceeding, which was pending on appeal at the time the legislative enactment became effective. Bradley v. Richmond School Board (1974) 416 U.S. 696 [40 L.Ed.2d 476, 94 S.Ct. 2006] is perhaps the leading case on point. In Bradley, a school desegregation case, no statutory provision authorized an award of attorney fees at the time the trial court ruled on plaintiffs' motion therefor, but the trial court nonetheless concluded that plaintiffs deserved such fees on nonstatutory grounds. While the attorney fee ruling was pending before the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, Congress enacted a new statute specifically authorizing awards for attorney fees in school desegregation cases. (20 U.S.C. § 1617.) Despite the recent statutory enactment, the Fourth Circuit reversed the award, concluding that the new statute applied only to legal services rendered after the effective date of the statute and that, in the absence of explicit statutory authorization, the trial court had erred in awarding attorney fees. The United States Supreme Court, however, reversed the Fourth Circuit's decision, concluding that the newly enacted attorney fee provision should be applied to all attorney fee rulings pending on appeal at the time the new statute became effective. The court anchored its holding ... on the principle that a court is to apply the law in effect at the time it renders its decision unless doing so would result in manifest injustice or there is statutory direction or legislative history to the contrary. (416 U.S. at p. 711 [40 L.Ed.2d at p. 488].) The high tribunal concluded that the recently adopted attorney fee statute, though enacted after the attorney fees in question had been incurred and subsequent to the trial court's order, applied because the attorney fee order was pending on appeal when the statute took effect. Accordingly, the Bradley court remanded the case to the trial court with directions to apply the intervening statute. Subsequent to Bradley, numerous federal courts have followed Bradley's reasoning in concluding that a variety of newly enacted attorney fee provisions should be applied to attorney fee rulings pending on appeal on the effective date of the statutes. (See, e.g., Gore v. Turner (5th Cir.1977) 563 F.2d 159, 163 [applying 42 U.S.C. § 1988]; Alphin v. Henson (4th Cir.1977) 552 F.2d 1033, 1034 [15 U.S.C. § 26]; Torres v. Sachs (2d Cir.1976) 538 F.2d 10, 12-13 [42 U.S.C. § 1973 l (e)].) The California decisions are in accord with the governing federal rule. In Olson v. Hickman (1972) 25 Cal. App.3d 920 [102 Cal. Rptr. 248], while an administrative mandamus action was pending on appeal the Legislature enacted section 800 of the Government Code, authorizing an award of attorney fees in such a proceeding when the administrative action resulted from arbitrary or capricious action or conduct by a public entity or an officer thereof. The defendant county claimed that the statute should not be applied retroactively to permit an attorney fee award in that case, but the Court of Appeal concluded that the statute should appropriately be applied to actions in which the appeal had not been finally determined when the statute became effective. Most recently, in Kievlan v. Dahlberg Electronics (1978) 78 Cal. App.3d 951, 959 [144 Cal. Rptr. 585], the Court of Appeal, relying on the Olson decision, specifically concluded that section 1021.5 of the Code of Civil Procedure, the private attorney general provision at issue in this case, should be applied to cases pending on appeal on the effective date of the statute. The Kievlan court remanded the case to the trial court, with directions to consider plaintiffs' attorney fee motion under the provisions of the new statute. Thus, under this established line of authority, section 1021.5 applies to the instant case.