Opinion ID: 1468976
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Federal Finality and Attorney's Fees

Text: In this case, the question presented is whether a decision on the merits of an application for the ancillary relief of alimony constituted a separately appealable final judgment, notwithstanding the fact that a related application for an award of attorney's fees remained undecided. At one time, the United States Supreme Court suggested the answer to the question of finality on the merits in federal courts, prior to ruling on a related request for attorney's fees, would turn upon the characterization of those [attorney's] fees by the statute or decisional law that authorizes them. [9] Several years later, after those distinctions caused more confusion than certainty, the United States Supreme Court adopted a uniform rule that an unresolved issue of attorney's fees does not prevent a judgment on the merits from being final. [10]