De Young v. Brown

Under Tanner v. OHSU, 161 Or App 129, where all citizens benefit from litigation, the fact that the individual benefit may be small does not reduce the substantiality of the benefit conferred to the citizenry as a whole.

The State appealed the Court of Appeals’ award of attorney fees to De Young. The State claimed that the Court of Appeals misapplied the “substantial benefit” test. On appeal, the State argued that the benefit conferred to all Oregonians by judicial clarification of how the legislature may exempt an election measure vote from statutory requirements was too “abstract [and] widely held” to “be considered substantial enough to warrant an equitable fee.” In response, De Young argued that clarification of “local home rule authority,” disincorporation statutes, and “legislative referrals” conferred substantial enough benefits to support a fee award. Under Tanner v. OHSU, 161 Or App 129, where all citizens benefit from litigation, the fact that the individual benefit may be small does not reduce the substantiality of the benefit conferred to the citizenry as a whole. The Court found that De Young “acted in a representative capacity to the benefit of others.” The Court further found that “clarifying how the legislature may make referrals to voters on matters of local government structure” implicated “important legal rights” including the “constitutional rights of citizens to vote and of local governments to establish and modify their political structures” and therefore conferred a substantial benefit to all Oregonians. The decision of the Court of Appeals is affirmed, and the case is remanded to the circuit court for further proceedings.