Fox v. Vice

(Slip Opinion) OCTOBER TERM, 2010 1

Syllabus

NOTE: Where it is feasible, a syllabus (headnote) will be released, as is

being done in connection with this case, at the time the opinion is issued.

The syllabus constitutes no part of the opinion of the Court but has been

prepared by the Reporter of Decisions for the convenience of the reader.

See United States v. Detroit Timber & Lumber Co., 200 U. S. 321, 337.

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES

Syllabus

FOX v. VICE, AS EXECUTRIX OF THE ESTATE OF VICE,

ET AL.

CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR

THE FIFTH CIRCUIT

No. 10–114. Argued March 22, 2011—Decided June 6, 2011

Claiming that he was subjected to dirty tricks during his successful

campaign to become the police chief of Vinton, La., petitioner Fox

filed a state-court suit against Vice, the incumbent chief, and the

town (Vice, for short). Fox’s suit asserted both state-law claims, in

cluding defamation, and federal civil rights claims under 42 U. S. C.

§1983, including interference with Fox’s right to seek public office.

Vice removed the case to federal court based on the §1983 claims. Af

ter discovery, he sought summary judgment on the federal claims,

which Fox conceded were not valid. The District Court accordingly

dismissed them with prejudice and remanded the remaining claims

to state court, noting that Vice’s attorneys’ work could be useful in

the state-court proceedings. Vice then asked the federal court for at

torney’s fees under §1988, submitting attorney billing records esti

mating the time spent on the entire suit, without differentiating be

tween time spent on the now-dismissed federal claims and on the

remaining state claims. The court granted the motion on the ground

that Fox’s federal claims were frivolous, awarding Vice fees for all

work his attorneys had performed in the suit. Although the state-law

allegations had not been found frivolous, the court did not require

Vice to separate out the work the attorneys had done on the two sets

of claims. It also declined to reduce the fee award to reflect the sur

viving state-law claims, noting that both sides had focused on the

frivolous §1983 claims. The Fifth Circuit affirmed, rejecting Fox’s

argument that every claim in a suit must be frivolous for the defen

dant to recover any fees, and agreeing with the District Court that

the litigation had focused on the frivolous federal claims.

2 FOX v. VICE

Syllabus

Held:

1. When a plaintiff’s suit involves both frivolous and non-frivolous

claims, a court may grant reasonable fees to the defendant, but only

for costs that the defendant would not have incurred but for the frivo

lous claims. Pp. 5–11.

(a) Section 1988 allows the award of “a reasonable attorney’s fee”

to “the prevailing party” in certain civil rights cases, including §1983

suits. While most of this Court’s §1988 decisions have concerned fees

to prevailing plaintiffs, §1988 also authorizes a fee award to a pre

vailing defendant “upon a finding that the plaintiff’s action was frivo

lous, unreasonable, or without foundation.” Christiansburg Garment

Co. v. EEOC, 434 U. S. 412, 421. Just as plaintiffs may receive fees

under §1988 even if they are not victorious on every claim, Hensley v.

Eckerhart, 461 U. S. 424, 435, so too may a defendant be reimbursed

for costs under §1988 even if the plaintiff’s suit is not wholly frivo

lous, ibid., n. 10. The defendant is not entitled to fees arising from

these non-frivolous charges, see Christiansburg, 434 U. S., at 420–

421, but the presence of reasonable allegations does not immunize

the plaintiff against paying for the fees that his frivolous claims im

posed. Pp. 5–7.

(b) The question then becomes how to allocate fees in a lawsuit

having both frivolous and non-frivolous claims. Congress’s purpose

in enacting §1988—to relieve defendants of the burdens associated

with fending off frivolous litigation—points to the proper standard:

Section 1988 allows a defendant to recover reasonable attorney’s fees

incurred because of, but only because of, a frivolous claim; i.e., §1988

permits the defendant to receive only the portion of his fees that he

would not have paid but for the frivolous claim. A standard allowing

more expansive fee-shifting would furnish windfalls to some defen

dants, who would be relieved of normal litigation costs merely be

cause the plaintiff’s suit also included frivolous claims. This “but-for”

standard may, in some instances, allow compensation to a defendant

for attorney work relating to both frivolous and non-frivolous claims,

for instance, if the frivolous claim requires a lawyer to do more work

because of the defendant’s greater financial exposure on that claim.

The dispositive question is not whether attorney costs at all relate to

a non-frivolous claim, but whether the costs would have been in

curred in the absence of the frivolous allegation. The answers to

those inquiries will usually track each other, but when they diverge,

it is the second one that matters. The determination of fees “should

not result in a second major litigation.” Hensley, 461 U. S., at 437.

The essential goal in shifting fees is to do rough justice, not to

achieve auditing perfection. The trial court has wide discretion, but

must apply the correct but-for standard. And the appeals court must

Cite as: 563 U. S. ____ (2011) 3

Syllabus

determine whether the trial court asked and answered this but-for

question, rather than some other. Pp. 7–11.

2. The lower courts used an incorrect standard in awarding fees to

Vice. The District Court’s analysis suggests that Vice’s attorneys

would have done much the same work even if Fox had not brought

his frivolous claims. The charges arose out of Vice’s conduct in the

campaign, and with respect both to the frivolous federal claims and to

the non-frivolous state-law claims, his “defense entailed proof or de

nial of essentially the same facts.” It thus seems likely that Vice’s at

torneys would have, e.g., taken many of the same depositions. Al

though the District Court noted the usefulness of the attorneys’ work

in defending against the state-law claims, it failed to take proper ac

count of the overlap between the frivolous and non-frivolous claims.

Its reasoning—that the close relationship between the federal and

state-law claims supported the award—cannot be squared with the

congressional policy of sparing defendants from the costs only of

frivolous litigation. Nor did the Fifth Circuit uphold the award on

the proper ground. It seemed to think Vice could receive fees for any

work useful to defending against a frivolous claim, even if his lawyers

would have done that work regardless. On this record, the case must

be returned to the lower courts. Pp. 12–13.

594 F. 3d 423, vacated and remanded.

KAGAN, J., delivered the opinion for a unanimous Court.

Cite as: 563 U. S. ____ (2011) 1

Opinion of the Court

NOTICE: This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in the

preliminary print of the United States Reports. Readers are requested to

notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Court of the United States, Wash

ington, D. C. 20543, of any typographical or other formal errors, in order

that corrections may be made before the preliminary print goes to press.

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES

_________________

No. 10–114

_________________

RICKY D. FOX, PETITIONER v. JUDY ANN VICE, AS

EXECUTRIX OF THE ESTATE OFBILLY RAY VICE, ET AL.

ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF

APPEALS FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT

[June 6, 2011]

JUSTICE KAGAN delivered the opinion of the Court.

Federal law authorizes a court to award a reasonable

attorney’s fee to the prevailing party in certain civil rights

cases. See 42 U. S. C. §1988. We have held that a defen

dant may receive such an award if the plaintiff’s suit is

frivolous. In this case, the plaintiff asserted both frivolous

and non-frivolous claims. We hold today that a court may

grant reasonable fees to the defendant in this circum

stance, but only for costs that the defendant would not

have incurred but for the frivolous claims. A trial court

has wide discretion in applying this standard. But here

we must vacate the judgment below because the court

used a different and incorrect standard in awarding fees.

I

This case arises out of an election for chief of police in

the town of Vinton, Louisiana. The candidates were peti

tioner Ricky Fox (the challenger) and respondent Billy Ray

Vice (the incumbent).1 By Fox’s account, Vice resorted to

——————

1 Vice died during the course of this litigation. Pursuant to this

Court’s Rule 35.1, we substituted the executor of his estate as respon

dent. 562 U. S. ___ (2011). But for the sake of clarity, we refer to the

2 FOX v. VICE

Opinion of the Court

an assortment of dirty tricks to try to force Fox out of the

race. In particular, Vice sent an anonymous letter to Fox

threatening to publish damaging charges against him if he

remained a candidate. Vice also arranged for a third party

to publicly accuse Fox of using racial slurs and then to file

a criminal complaint against Fox repeating those allega

tions. And when prosecutors ignored that faux complaint,

Vice leaked it to the press. Yet all of these machinations

failed; Fox won the election. And Vice got an even greater

comeuppance: He was subsequently convicted of criminal

extortion for his election-related conduct.

Fox, however, chose not to let the matter rest; he filed

this suit in Louisiana state court against Vice and the

town of Vinton, also a respondent here. Fox’s complaint

asserted both state-law claims, including defamation, and

federal civil rights claims under 42 U. S. C. §1983, includ

ing interference with his right to seek public office. Vice

and the town (Vice, for short) removed the case to federal

court on the basis of the §1983 claims.

At the end of discovery in the suit, Vice moved for sum

mary judgment on Fox’s federal claims. Fox conceded that

the claims were “no[t] valid,” App. 169, and the District

Court accordingly dismissed them with prejudice. In the

same ruling, the court declined to exercise supplemental

jurisdiction over the remaining state-law claims. Docket

No. 2:06–cv–135 (WD La., Oct. 16, 2007), App. to Pet. for

Cert. 38a–40a. The court instead remanded the now

slimmed-down case to state court for adjudication. In

doing so, the District Court observed that “[a]ny trial

preparation, legal research, and discovery may be used by

the parties in the state court proceedings.” Id., at 40a.

Vice then asked the federal court for an award of attor

ney’s fees under §1988, arguing that Fox’s federal claims

were “baseless and without merit.” App. 198. Vice stated

——————

respondent as Vice.

Cite as: 563 U. S. ____ (2011) 3

Opinion of the Court

that his lawyers had had to participate in five lengthy

depositions and review numerous records to defend

against Fox’s charges. Id., at 199. In support of his fee

request, Vice submitted attorney billing records estimat

ing the time spent on the whole suit, without differentiat

ing between the federal and state-law claims. See Supp.

App. 8–67.

The District Court granted the motion for attorney’s fees

on the ground that Fox’s federal claims were frivolous.

Although the state-law allegations had not been found

frivolous (and indeed remained live), the court did not

require Vice to separate out the work his attorneys had

done on the two sets of claims. Docket No. 2:06–cv–135

(WD La., Sept. 22, 2008), App. to Pet. for Cert. 28a. Ac

cording to the court, such “segregation” was unnecessary

because the “various claims arose out of the same transac

tion and were so interrelated that their prosecution or

defense entailed proof or denial of essentially the same

facts.” Ibid. (internal quotation marks omitted). Simi

larly, the court declined to reduce the fee award to reflect

the surviving state-law claims. “[T]hroughout the litiga

tion,” the court stated, both sides “focus[ed]” on Fox’s

frivolous §1983 claims. Id., at 32a–33a. The court there

fore concluded that Vice should receive all of the fees he

reasonably incurred in defending the suit—a total of

$48,681. Id., at 34a.

A divided Court of Appeals affirmed. 594 F. 3d 423

(CA5 2010). The majority first rejected Fox’s contention

that all claims in a suit must be frivolous for the defen

dant to recover any fees. That rule, the court explained,

would “ ‘allow plaintiffs to prosecute frivolous claims with

out consequenc[e]’ ” so long as they added a single non

frivolous claim. Id., at 428 (quoting Tutor-Saliba Corp. v.

Hailey, 452 F. 3d 1055, 1064 (CA9 2006)). The Court of

Appeals then turned to the District Court’s decision that

Vice was entitled to fees for all time thus far spent on the

4 FOX v. VICE

Opinion of the Court

case, even though state-law claims remained unadjudi

cated. Repeating the trial court’s view that the whole

litigation had focused on the frivolous federal claims, the

Fifth Circuit upheld the fee award. See 594 F. 3d, at 428.

Judge Southwick dissented. He agreed that Vice was

entitled to some reimbursement for fees. Id., at 430. But

he thought the District Court had erred in declining to

“allocate the fees separately between the successful claims

and the unsuccessful” ones just because all of them were

“interrelated.” Ibid. “[W]hen some claims are dismissed

as frivolous and others are not,” he stated, the defendants

should receive fees only for “the legal work allocable solely

or dominantly to the dismissed” claims. Id., at 431. Be

cause in this case “almost all of the defendant[s’] discovery

and factual analysis would have been necessary even if no

federal claims had been brought,” he concluded, the fee

award should have been much smaller. Ibid.

The Fifth Circuit’s decision deepened a Circuit split

about whether and to what extent a court may award fees

to a defendant under §1988 when a plaintiff asserts both

frivolous and non-frivolous claims.2 One Court of Appeals

has forbidden any compensation unless all of the plaintiff’s

claims are frivolous. See Balmer v. HCA, Inc., 423 F. 3d

606, 617 (CA6 2005). Others have rejected this approach,

but struggled with how to allocate fees in a suit that in

volves a mix of frivolous and non-frivolous claims. Com

pare, e.g., 594 F. 3d 423 (CA5 2010) (opinion below), with

Colombrito v. Kelly, 764 F. 2d 122, 132 (CA2 1985) (declin

ing to award fees when the frivolous claim “added no

additional testimony or expense to the trial”). We granted

——————

2 The parties do not dispute for purposes of argument here that this

case involves both kinds of claims. The District Court deemed the

federal claims frivolous, and Fox has not asked us to disturb that

ruling. See Brief for Petitioner 26, and n. 2. The court remanded the

state-law claims to state court, and Vice has assumed in this Court that

they are not frivolous. See Brief for Respondents 8, n. 5.

Cite as: 563 U. S. ____ (2011) 5

Opinion of the Court

certiorari to resolve these questions. 562 U. S. ___ (2010).

II

Our legal system generally requires each party to bear

his own litigation expenses, including attorney’s fees, re

gardless whether he wins or loses. Indeed, this principle

is so firmly entrenched that it is known as the “American

Rule.” See Alyeska Pipeline Service Co. v. Wilderness

Society, 421 U. S. 240, 247 (1975). But Congress has

authorized courts to deviate from this background rule in

certain types of cases by shifting fees from one party to

another. See Burlington v. Dague, 505 U. S. 557, 562

(1992) (listing federal fee-shifting provisions).

The statute involved here, 42 U. S. C. §1988, allows the

award of “a reasonable attorney’s fee” to “the prevailing

party” in various kinds of civil rights cases, including suits

brought under §1983. Most of our decisions addressing

this provision have concerned the grant of fees to prevail

ing plaintiffs. When a plaintiff succeeds in remedying a

civil rights violation, we have stated, he serves “as

a ‘private attorney general,’ vindicating a policy that

Congress considered of the highest priority.” Newman v.

Piggie Park Enterprises, Inc., 390 U. S. 400, 402 (1968)

(per curiam). He therefore “should ordinarily recover an

attorney’s fee” from the defendant—the party whose mis

conduct created the need for legal action. Christiansburg

Garment Co. v. EEOC, 434 U. S. 412, 416 (1978) (internal

quotation marks omitted). Fee shifting in such a case at

once reimburses a plaintiff for “what it cos[t] [him] to

vindicate [civil] rights,” Riverside v. Rivera, 477 U. S. 561,

577–578 (1986) (internal quotation marks omitted), and

holds to account “a violator of federal law,” Christians

burg, 434 U. S., at 418.

In Christiansburg, we held that §1988 also authorizes a

fee award to a prevailing defendant, but under a different

standard reflecting the “quite different equitable consid

6 FOX v. VICE

Opinion of the Court

erations” at stake. Id., at 419. In enacting §1988, we

stated, Congress sought “to protect defendants from bur

densome litigation having no legal or factual basis.” Id.,

at 420. Accordingly, §1988 authorizes a district court to

award attorney’s fees to a defendant “upon a finding that

the plaintiff’s action was frivolous, unreasonable, or with

out foundation.” Id., at 421; see also Kentucky v. Graham,

473 U. S. 159, 165, n. 9 (1985).

These standards would be easy to apply if life were like

the movies, but that is usually not the case. In Hollywood,

litigation most often concludes with a dramatic verdict

that leaves one party fully triumphant and the other

utterly prostrate. The court in such a case would know

exactly how to award fees (even if that anti-climactic scene

is generally left on the cutting-room floor). But in the real

world, litigation is more complex, involving multiple

claims for relief that implicate a mix of legal theories and

have different merits. Some claims succeed; others fail.

Some charges are frivolous; others (even if not ultimately

successful) have a reasonable basis. In short, litigation is

messy, and courts must deal with this untidiness in

awarding fees.

Given this reality, we have made clear that plaintiffs

may receive fees under §1988 even if they are not victori

ous on every claim. A civil rights plaintiff who obtains

meaningful relief has corrected a violation of federal law

and, in so doing, has vindicated Congress’s statutory pur

poses. That “result is what matters,” we explained in

Hensley v. Eckerhart, 461 U. S. 424, 435 (1983): A court

should compensate the plaintiff for the time his attorney

reasonably spent in achieving the favorable outcome, even

if “the plaintiff failed to prevail on every contention.” Ibid.

The fee award, of course, should not reimburse the plain

tiff for work performed on claims that bore no relation to

the grant of relief: Such work “cannot be deemed to have

been expended in pursuit of the ultimate result achieved.”

Cite as: 563 U. S. ____ (2011) 7

Opinion of the Court

Ibid. (internal quotation marks omitted). But the pres

ence of these unsuccessful claims does not immunize a

defendant against paying for the attorney’s fees that the

plaintiff reasonably incurred in remedying a breach of his

civil rights.

Analogous principles indicate that a defendant may

deserve fees even if not all the plaintiff’s claims were

frivolous. In this context, §1988 serves to relieve a defen

dant of expenses attributable to frivolous charges. The

plaintiff acted wrongly in leveling such allegations, and

the court may shift to him the reasonable costs that those

claims imposed on his adversary. See Christiansburg, 434

U. S., at 420–421. That remains true when the plaintiff’s

suit also includes non-frivolous claims. The defendant, of

course, is not entitled to any fees arising from these non

frivolous charges. See ibid. But the presence of reason

able allegations in a suit does not immunize the plaintiff

against paying for the fees that his frivolous claims

imposed.

Indeed, we have previously said exactly this much. In

Hensley, we noted the possibility that a plaintiff might

prevail on one contention in a suit while also asserting an

unrelated frivolous claim. In this situation, we explained,

a court could properly award fees to both parties—to the

plaintiff, to reflect the fees he incurred in bringing the

meritorious claim; and to the defendant, to compensate for

the fees he paid in defending against the frivolous one.

See 461 U. S., at 435, n. 10. We thus made clear that a

court may reimburse a defendant for costs under §1988

even if a plaintiff’s suit is not wholly frivolous. Fee

shifting to recompense a defendant (as to recompense a

plaintiff) is not all-or-nothing: A defendant need not show

that every claim in a complaint is frivolous to qualify for

fees.

The question then becomes one of allocation: In a law

suit involving a mix of frivolous and non-frivolous claims,

8 FOX v. VICE

Opinion of the Court

what work may the defendant receive fees for? Vice con

cedes, as he must, that a defendant may not obtain com

pensation for work unrelated to a frivolous claim. Brief

for Respondents 42, n. 13. Similarly, we think Fox would

have to concede (once he has lost the argument that the

presence of any non-frivolous claim precludes a fee award)

that the defendant may receive reasonable fees for work

related exclusively to a frivolous claim. The question in

dispute concerns work that helps defend against non

frivolous and frivolous claims alike—for example, a depo

sition eliciting facts relevant to both allegations.

Vice proposes authorizing the trial court to award fees

for work that is “fairly attributable” to the frivolous por

tion of the lawsuit. See, e.g., Tr. of Oral Arg. 41, 45. But

that standard is in truth no standard at all. The very

question under consideration is: What fees may be fairly

attributed to frivolous claims under §1988? To answer

“Those that are fairly attributable to frivolous claims” is

just to restate this question. And that non-response re

sponse would leave to each and every trial court not only

the implementation, but also the invention, of the applica

ble legal standard. We do not think trial courts would

appreciate that lack of guidance. And yet more important,

we do not think such an empty and amorphous test would

ensure that all fee awards to defendants comport with

Congress’s purpose in enacting §1988.

That congressional policy points to a different and more

meaningful standard: Section 1988 allows a defendant to

recover reasonable attorney’s fees incurred because of, but

only because of, a frivolous claim. Or what is the same

thing stated as a but-for test: Section 1988 permits the

defendant to receive only the portion of his fees that he

would not have paid but for the frivolous claim. Recall

that the relevant purpose of §1988 is to relieve defendants

of the burdens associated with fending off frivolous litiga

tion. See supra, at 5–6. So if a frivolous claim occasioned

Cite as: 563 U. S. ____ (2011) 9

Opinion of the Court

the attorney’s fees at issue, a court may decide that the

defendant should not have to pay them. But if the defen

dant would have incurred those fees anyway, to defend

against non-frivolous claims, then a court has no basis

for transferring the expense to the plaintiff. Suppose, for

example, that a defendant’s attorney conducts a deposition

on matters relevant to both a frivolous and a non-frivolous

claim—and more, that the lawyer would have taken and

committed the same time to this deposition even if the

case had involved only the non-frivolous allegation. In

that circumstance, the work does not implicate Congress’s

reason for allowing defendants to collect fees. The defen

dant would have incurred the expense in any event; he has

suffered no incremental harm from the frivolous claim. In

short, the defendant has never shouldered the burden that

Congress, in enacting §1988, wanted to relieve. The basic

American Rule thus continues to operate.3

A standard allowing more expansive fee-shifting would

furnish windfalls to some defendants, making them better

off because they were subject to a suit including frivolous

claims. For under any more permissive test, the simple

presence of a frivolous claim would allow the court to shift

——————

3 The test set out here differs from the one we adopted in Hensley v.

Eckerhart, 461 U. S. 424, 435 (1983), to govern fee awards to plaintiffs

in cases involving both successful and unsuccessful claims. See supra,

at 6–7. That difference reflects the disparate legislative purposes we

have recognized in the two settings. See Christiansburg Garment Co. v.

EEOC, 434 U. S. 412, 419–420 (1978); supra, at 5–6. Congress author

ized fees to plaintiffs to compensate them for the costs of redressing

civil rights violations; accordingly, a plaintiff may receive fees for all

work relating to the accomplishment of that result, even if “the plaintiff

failed to prevail on every contention raised.” Hensley, 461 U. S., at 435.

By contrast, Congress authorized fees to defendants to remove the

burden associated with fending off frivolous claims; accordingly, a

defendant may recover for fees that those claims caused him to incur.

In each context, the standard for allocating fees in “mixed” cases

matches the relevant congressional purpose.

10 FOX v. VICE

Opinion of the Court

to the plaintiff some of the costs of defending against

regular, non-frivolous charges. So two defendants (call

them Vice and Rice) could face identical non-frivolous

allegations, but because Vice also confronted a frivolous

claim, he might end by paying less than Rice to his attor

neys. The chance assertion—for Vice, the downright lucky

assertion—of the frivolous claim could relieve him not only

of the incremental costs of that claim but also of costs that

he, like Rice, would have had to pay in its absence. Sec

tion 1988 provides no warrant for that peculiar result;

that statute was “never intended to produce windfalls” for

parties. See Farrar v. Hobby, 506 U. S. 103, 115 (1992)

(internal quotation marks omitted).

At the same time, the “but-for” standard we require may

in some cases allow compensation to a defendant for at

torney work relating to both frivolous and non-frivolous

claims. Suppose, for example, that a plaintiff asserts one

frivolous and one non-frivolous claim, but that only the

frivolous allegation can legally result in a damages award.

If an attorney performs work useful to defending against

both, but did so only because of the defendant’s monetary

exposure on the frivolous charge, a court may decide to

shift fees. Or similarly, imagine that the frivolous claim

enables removal of the case to federal court, which in

turn drives up litigation expenses. Here too, our standard

would permit awarding fees for work relevant to both

claims in order to reflect the increased costs (if any) of the

federal forum. And frivolous claims may increase the cost

of defending a suit in ways that are not reflected in the

number of hours billed. If a defendant could prove, for

example, that a frivolous claim involved a specialized area

that reasonably caused him to hire more expensive coun

sel for the entire case, then the court may reimburse the

defendant for the increased marginal cost. As all these

examples show, the dispositive question is not whether

attorney costs at all relate to a non-frivolous claim, but

Cite as: 563 U. S. ____ (2011) 11

Opinion of the Court

whether the costs would have been incurred in the ab

sence of the frivolous allegation. The answers to those

inquiries will usually track each other, but when they

diverge, it is the second that matters.

We emphasize, as we have before, that the determina

tion of fees “should not result in a second major litigation.”

Hensley, 461 U. S., at 437. The fee applicant (whether a

plaintiff or a defendant) must, of course, submit appropri

ate documentation to meet “the burden of establishing

entitlement to an award.” Ibid. But trial courts need not,

and indeed should not, become green-eyeshade account

ants. The essential goal in shifting fees (to either party) is

to do rough justice, not to achieve auditing perfection. So

trial courts may take into account their overall sense of a

suit, and may use estimates in calculating and allocating

an attorney’s time. And appellate courts must give sub

stantial deference to these determinations, in light of “the

district court’s superior understanding of the litigation.”

Ibid.; see Webb v. Dyer County Bd. of Ed., 471 U. S. 234,

244 (1985). We can hardly think of a sphere of judicial

decisionmaking in which appellate micromanagement has

less to recommend it.

But the trial court must apply the correct standard, and

the appeals court must make sure that has occurred. See

Perdue v. Kenny A., 559 U. S. ___, ___ (2010) (slip op., at

14) (“Determining a ‘reasonable attorney’s fee’ is a matter

that is committed to the sound discretion of a trial judge,

. . . but the judge’s discretion is not unlimited”); Cf. Koon

v. United States, 518 U. S. 81, 100 (1996) (“A district court

by definition abuses its discretion when it makes an error

of law”). That means the trial court must determine

whether the fees requested would not have accrued but for

the frivolous claim. And the appeals court must determine

whether the trial court asked and answered that question,

rather than some other. A trial court has wide discretion

when, but only when, it calls the game by the right rules.

12 FOX v. VICE

Opinion of the Court

III

The task remains of applying these principles to the fee

award Vice received. The District Court’s analysis sug

gests that Vice’s attorneys would have done much the

same work even if Fox had not brought his frivolous

claims. As noted earlier, see supra, at 3, the court ac

knowledged that Fox’s federal and state-law claims were

“interrelated,” App. to Pet. for Cert. 28a (internal quota

tion marks omitted). The charges “arose out of the same

transaction”—Vice’s conduct in the campaign—and their

“defense entailed proof or denial of essentially the same

facts.” Ibid. (internal quotation marks omitted). It there

fore seems likely that Vice’s attorneys would at least have

conducted similar fact-gathering activities—taken many of

the same depositions, produced and reviewed many of the

same documents, and so forth. Indeed, the District Court

highlighted the usefulness of the attorneys’ work to de

fending against the state-law claims: In its order remand

ing those claims, the court noted that the “trial prepara

tion, legal research, and discovery” done in the federal

court could “be used by the parties in the state court pro

ceedings.” Id., at 40a.

The District Court’s decision to award full attorney’s

fees to Vice failed to take proper account of this overlap

between the frivolous and non-frivolous claims. Rather

than apply the but-for standard we have set out, the court

indicated that the paramount factor was the parties’ “fo

cus” in the litigation. Id., at 33a. The court did not ad

dress whether the “interrelated[ness]” of the claims meant

that Vice would have incurred part or most of his fees even

if Fox had asserted only the non-frivolous state-law

claims. To the contrary, the court suggested that the close

relationship between the federal and state-law claims

supported Vice’s request to recover all of his attorney’s

fees. See id., at 28a; supra, at 3. That reasoning stands

the appropriate analysis on its head. It cannot be squared

Cite as: 563 U. S. ____ (2011) 13

Opinion of the Court

with the congressional policy of sparing defendants from

the costs of frivolous litigation.

Nor did the Court of Appeals uphold the award of fees

on the ground that we would require. The majority articu

lated a standard that, taken alone, might be read as con

sistent with our opinion; according to the court, a defen

dant should receive fees for “work which can be distinctly

traced to a plaintiff’s frivolous claims.” 594 F. 3d, at 429.

But the court seemed to think that its test permitted

awarding Vice fees for any work useful to defending

against a frivolous claim, even if lawyers would have done

that work regardless. Indeed, this very point divided the

majority and the dissent. Judge Southwick objected to the

fee award on the ground that “almost all [of] the defen

dant[s’] discovery and factual analysis would have been

necessary even if no federal claims had been brought.” Id.,

at 431. But the majority never responded to that argu

ment or otherwise engaged this crucial question. The

majority instead merely reiterated the District Court’s

reasoning that the parties had principally “focus[ed]” on

the §1983 allegations. That finding, as we have explained,

is irrelevant if Vice’s attorneys would have performed the

same work to defend against the state-law claims.

On this record, we must return the case to the lower

courts. See, e.g., Perdue, 559 U. S., at ___–___ (slip op., at

12–15); Pennsylvania v. Delaware Valley Citizens’ Council

for Clean Air, 478 U. S. 546, 566–568 (1986); Hensley, 461

U. S., at 438–440. In a suit of this kind, involving both

frivolous and non-frivolous claims, a defendant may re

cover the reasonable attorney’s fees he expended solely

because of the frivolous allegations. And that is all. Con

sistent with the policy underlying §1988, the defendant

may not receive compensation for any fees that he would

have paid in the absence of the frivolous claims. We there

fore vacate the judgment of the Court of Appeals and

remand the case for further proceedings consistent with

this opinion.

It is so ordered.