08-1322 Astrue v. Ratliff

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Civil Procedure
EAJA; attorney fees

An award of attorney fees pursuant to the Equal Access to Justice Act is payable to the litigant, and thus is subject to offset to satisfy the litigant’s pre-existing debts to the government.
Nothing in EAJA contradicts this Court’s longstanding view that the term “prevailing party” in attorney’s fees statutes is a “term of art” that refers to the prevailing litigant. See, e.g., Buckhannon Board & Care Home, Inc. v. West Virginia Dept. of Health and Human Resources, 532 U. S. 598, 603. That the term has its usual meaning in subsection (d)(1)(A) is underscored by the fact that subsection (d)(1)(B) and other provisions clearly distinguish the party who receives the fees award (the litigant) from the attorney who performed the work that generated the fees. The Court disagrees with Ratliff’s assertion that subsection (d)(1)(A)’s use of the verb “award” nonetheless renders §2412(d) fees payable directly to a prevailing party’s attorney. The dictionaries show that, in the litigation context, the transitive verb “award” has the settled meaning of giving or assigning by judicial decree. Its plain meaning in subsection (d)(1)(A) is thus that the court shall “give or assign by . . . judicial determination” to the “prevailing party” (here, Ree) attorney’s fees in the amount sought and substantiated under, inter alia, subsection (d)(1)(B). That the prevailing party’s attorney may have a beneficial interest or a contractual right in the fees does not alter this conclusion.
540 F. 3d 800, reversed and remanded.

08-1322 Astrue v. Ratliff

Thomas, J.; Sotomayor, J., concurring.