Court Opinion

ID: 9471034
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 03:23:58.328555+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:42:14.908735
License: Public Domain

MERRITT, Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
Although I agree with the majority’s position on the award of costs, I must respectfully dissent from the Court’s denial of DeFord’s request for attorney’s fees. We have neither express statutory language nor precedential interpretation of an analogous statute to guide us on this question of statutory interpretation, but a consideration of the purpose of the legislation convinces me that DeFord should recover attorney’s fees for his appeal from the Secretary’s order.
The majority correctly states that the issue before us boils down to whether the language of 42 U.S.C. § 5851(b)(2)(B), providing for an award by the Secretary of attorney’s fees “reasonably incurred ... by the complainant, for, or in connection with, the bringing of the complaint upon which the order was issued,” should be construed to include the award of fees incurred before this Court for review of the Secretary’s order. There is an explicit provision for an award of attorney’s fees by the District Court if a new action must be brought to obtain compliance with the Secretary’s order. 42 U.S.C. § 5851(e)(2). Although there is no provision for attorney’s fees in subsection (c), which provides for review of the Secretary’s order in the Court of Appeals, the absence of such a provision does not conclude the matter, as the majority seems to believe. Review in the Court of Appeals is not a new action, as is a District Court action under § 5851(e). Rather it is simply a continuation of the action before the Secretary. The action before us is the appellate or review phase of the original action before the Secretary. The complainant’s attorney’s fees before us are, in the words of the statute, “incurred ... in connection with the ... [same] complaint upon which the [Secretary’s] order was issued,” and hence the same attorney’s fees provi*234sion is applicable before us as in the proceeding which we review.
The purpose of § 5851, as stated in the legislative history, is to “provide protection to employees of Commission licensees, applicants, contractors or subcontractors from discharge or discrimination for taking part or assisting in administrative or legal proceedings of the Commission.” 1978 U.S. Code Cong. & Ad.News 7303 at 7309. That is, Congress wished to protect from retaliation by their employers whistle blowers who aid the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The provisions for attorney’s fees in the statute are consistent with this purpose: A complainant on whose behalf an order is issued — the “whistle blower” — can recover attorney’s fees from the Secretary or from a district court if he has to sue to obtain compliance, but a “person adversely affected or aggrieved” by the Secretary’s order— usually the employer against whom the order was issued — cannot recover costs or attorney’s fees.
This case is unusual in that the complainant “on whose behalf the order was issued” is also the person “aggrieved” by the order. DeFord had to seek review in this Court in order to obtain the full protection to which the statute entitles him. It does no violence to the language of the Act, and in fact furthers the Congressional purpose, to interpret DeFord’s appeal as pursued “in connection with, the bringing of the complaint upon which the order was issued.” The purposes of the Act are not served unless the individuals it was meant to protect can pursue their rights to the fullest extent the law provides.
Accordingly) I would remand this petition to the Secretary for an award of attorney’s fees “reasonably incurred” by DeFord for this appeal.