"Congress enacted the Civil Rights Attorney's Fees Awards Act of 1976 in response to the Supreme Court decision in Alyeska Pipeline Service Co. v. Wilderness Society, 421 U.S. 240 (1975).
[3] The Supreme Court has also clarified in Buckhannon Board and Care Home v. West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources[4] that to prevail means to obtain a judicial decree on the merits of the case.
The court rejected the proposition that fee awards under 1988(b) should necessarily be proportionate the amount of damages a civil rights plaintiff actually recovers.
[11] Were this bill to become law, it would amend Section 1988 to disallow the awarding of attorneys' fees to prevailing parties in Establishment Clause cases, “including violations relating to: (1) religious words or imagery in veterans' memorials, public buildings, or official seals of states or their subdivisions; and (2) the chartering of Boy Scout units by states or their subdivisions and the Boy Scouts' using public buildings.”[12] 42 U.S.C.
[13] The latest amendment passed as Public Law 106-274 on September 22, 2000, and in relevant part added the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act of 2000 as an applicable statute under which the attorney's fees provision applies.