# Statewide Reapportionment Advisory Committee v. Beasley

> Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit · October 30, 1996 · 99 F.3d 134

URL: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9812932

## Case

- **Full name:** STATEWIDE REAPPORTIONMENT ADVISORY COMMITTEE; William Gibson, Doctor; Frederick Calhoun James, Bishop; Herbert Williams, Reverend; Willie B. Owens; South Carolina Conference of the NAACP Branches, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. David M. BEASLEY, in His Official Capacity as Governor of South Carolina; David H. Wilkins, in His Official Capacity as Speaker of the South Carolina House of Representatives, Defendants-Appellees, the South Carolina Senate, Intervenor; Michael G. BURTON, as Executive Director on Behalf of the REPUBLICAN PARTY; William P. Collins, III; Earl Copeland; William Patrick Flack; Frank E. Gibson, III; Nancy D. Hawk; Gus Roberts, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. David M. BEASLEY, in His Official Capacity as Governor of South Carolina; David H. Wilkins, in His Official Capacity as Speaker of the South Carolina House of Representatives, Defendants-Appellees, the South Carolina Senate, Intervenor
- **Court:** Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit
- **Decided:** October 30, 1996
- **Citations:** 99 F.3d 134; 1996 WL 626234
- **Precedential status:** Published
- **Opinion:** Concurrence by Niemeyer
- **Judges:** Niemeyer, Michael, Motz
- **Cited by:** 2 later opinions in the Frix Law Library

## Citator (automated)

- No negative treatment found by the automated citator. That is not the same as a confirmation that the case is good law; read the citing cases.
- Full citator and citing cases: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9812932

## Opinion text

NIEMEYER, Circuit Judge,
concurring:
To be a prevailing party in a legal action, a party must obtain relief in the action on the merits of his claim, see Farrar v. Hobby, 506 U.S. 103, 111 , 113 S.Ct. 566, 572-73 , 121 L.Ed.2d 494 (1992), and not from some other process. The fee shifting statutes, such as 42 U.S.C. §§ 19731 (e) and 1988, reward successful litigants, not success in the political process even if the political success was a response to the litigation. Accordingly, in S-1 and S-2 v. State Bd. of Educ., 21 F.3d 49, 51 (4th Cir.) (en banc) (adopting Judge Wilkinson’s dissent at 6 F.3d 160 (4th Cir.1993)), cert. denied, — U.S. -, 115 S.Ct. 205 , 130 L.Ed.2d 135 (1994), we rejected a broad catalyst theory for awarding attorneys fees to litigants simply because their position in litigation was vindicated by an external process or sequence of events outside of the litigation.
While I agree that S-1 and S-2 requires us to affirm in this case, I believe the question of who prevailed, even when measuring the results obtained through the political process, is so unclear that whether we apply S-1 and S-2 or evaluate who won in the political arena, I could not conclude that the district court abused its discretion in denying the appellants’ attorneys fees.

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Source: Frix Law Library, https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9812932. Public record. Not legal advice.