Court Opinion

ID: 9463900
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 23:19:41.209514+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:38:21.073207
License: Public Domain

*61GIBBONS, Circuit Judge,
concurring:
I join in the court’s judgment because I believe the result would be the same whether we applied Pennsylvania law or a federal rule. The prediction made by Judge Van Dusen that Pennsylvania would follow Vaughan v. Atkinson, 369 U.S. 527, 82 S.Ct. 997, 8 L.Ed.2d 88 (1962), and allow an award of attorneys’ fees, is convincing. I do not agree, however, that in a state which would not follow Vaughan v. Atkinson, a federal forum would be precluded from awarding attorneys’ fees for what amounts to a vexatious abuse of its process. I regard the award of attorneys’ fees on the authority of Vaughan v. Atkinson as more in the nature of costs than are such awards under the other exceptions to the American rule. Certainly the notions of federalism which underlie the Erie rule do not require that a federal forum accept the public policy of the state in which it happens to sit on a matter such as the award of costs for abuse of its process. Cf. Byrd v. Blue Ridge Cooperative, 356 U.S. 525, 78 S.Ct. 893, 2 L.Ed.2d 953 (1958). The issue need not, of course, be resolved here.