The Lawletter Vol. 50 No. 1
Robert Westendorf—Senior Attorney
In Virginia, a statute mandated that drivers lose their licenses when fines or penalties that they owed were not paid. Lackey v. Stinnie, 145 S. Ct. 659, 2025 U.S. LEXIS 866, at *5-6 (Feb. 25, 2025). Drivers whose licenses had been suspended sued and alleged violations of the Due Process and Equal Protection Clauses. Id. at *6. After the district court granted a preliminary injunction against the law, the case was stayed and later dismissed because the Virginia legislature repealed the law. Id.
The drivers asserted they were entitled to attorney’s fees under 42 U.S.C. § 1988(b), which allows prevailing parties in civil rights cases to receive attorney’s fees. Id. The en banc Fourth Circuit determined that the drivers were entitled to attorney’s fees. Id. at *7. The Supreme Court granted certiorari and reversed the Fourth Circuit by a 7-2 vote. Id. at *8. Chief Justice Roberts started the majority opinion by noting that the general rule in America is that the prevailing party is not entitled to collect attorney’s fees from the loser, and that federal courts can depart from this rule only when there is statutory authorization to do so. Id. at *8-9. At the time that Section 1988 was adopted, “prevailing party” is the party who ultimately prevails at the end of the lawsuit. Id. at *9-10. But preliminary injunctions “do not conclusively resolve legal disputes. In awarding preliminary injunctions, courts determine if a plaintiff is likely to succeed on the merits—along with the risk of irreparable harm, the balance of equities, and the public interest.” Id. at *10. The purpose of preliminary injunctions is to preserve the positions of the parties until a trial and often depends as much on the equities of the case as on the legal issues that are involved. Id. A preliminary injunction has a temporary nature because courts can reach a different conclusion at the permanent injunction stage. Id. at *11. Since preliminary injunctions do not “conclusively resolve the rights of parties on the merits, they do not confer prevailing party status.” Id. at *11.
The court found that this view followed from precedent, as previous decisions had established that for a party to be a “prevailing party” to get attorney’s fees, the change in the legal relationship between the parties must be enduring, and the change must be judicially sanctioned. Id. at *12-14. The court also found that this rule served the interests of judicial economy by reducing major litigation over attorney’s fees. Id. Since the drivers only gained preliminary injunctive relief before the case became moot, they were not prevailing parties entitled to attorney’s fees. Id. at *18.
Justices Jackson and Sotomayor dissented. Id. at *19. For the dissent, a prevailing party is one who has successfully maintained his claim when the matter is finally set at rest. Id. at *21-*22. The majority erred in requiring that a party receive a final judgment in their favor to receive attorney’s fees. Id. at *22.
Precedent indicated that a plaintiff prevails if he receives (1) actual relief on the merits of a claim in a manner that (2) materially alters the legal relationship between the parties by modifying the defendant’s behavior in a way that directly benefits the plaintiff. Id. at *27. In this case, the preliminary injunction provided the drivers with actual relief by reinstating their suspended licenses and thus worked a material alteration in the relationship between the parties. Id. at *28. The relief awarded was also on the merits because it provided “a resolution of the dispute which changes the legal relationship between [the plaintiff] and the defendant.” Id. (quoting Tex. State Tchrs. Ass'n v. Garland Indep. Sch. Dist., 489 U.S. 782, 792 (1989)). The dissent noted that a preliminary injunction can only be granted on a strong showing that a party is likely to succeed on the merits, and in this case, “the District Court thoroughly assessed the merits of respondents’ claims and granted their request for preliminary injunctive relief after extensive briefing and an evidentiary hearing during which multiple witnesses testified.” Id. at *29-30. The dissent concluded that “when a court hearing a civil rights lawsuit issues a preliminary injunction that materially alters the relationship between the parties and is never reversed, the requesting party ‘prevails’ for fee-shifting purposes and is thus eligible for a fee award under § 1988(b).” Id. at *41.
