Toni SAUNDERS, as parent and natural guardian of Chad Saunders, a minor, for and on behalf of Chad Saunders, Petitioner-Appellee, v. SECRETARY OF the DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES, Respondent-Appellant.
No. 93-5037.
United States Court of Appeals, Federal Circuit.
June 7, 1994.
25 F.3d 1031
Before ARCHER, Chief Judge, MAYER, and SCHALL, Circuit Judges.
Charles R. Gross, Atty., Dept. of Justice, Washington, DC, argued for respondent-appellant. With him on the brief were Stuart M. Gerson, Atty. Also on the brief were Stuart E. Schiffer, Acting Asst. Atty. Gen. and Helene M. Goldberg, Atty.
*SCHALL, Circuit Judge.
1. The Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (government) appeals from the September 30, 1992 judgment of the United States Claims Court,1 affirming the special master‘s decision awarding attorneys’ fees and costs to Toni Saunders (petitioner), on behalf of her son Chad Saunders, under the National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act of 1986 (Vaccine Act or Act),
BACKGROUND
2. On August 27, 1990, petitioner, as parent and natural guardian of Chad Saunders, filed a petition for compensation under the Vaccine Act in the Claims Court. Saunders, 26 Cl.Ct. at 1222. Petitioner alleged that her son was suffering from a permanent seizure disorder as a result of a diphtheria-pertussis-tetanus (DPT) vaccine administered on October 29, 1979. Id. After an evidentiary hearing, the special master found that petitioner had failed to prove by a preponderance of the evidence that the DPT vaccine was the cause-in-fact of her son‘s seizure disorder. Id.3 Petitioner did not seek review of the special master‘s decision, and on January 13, 1992, the Claims Court entered judgment dismissing her petition. Id. Thereafter, pursuant to
3. Under the Act, an unsuccessful petitioner may recover attorneys’ fees and costs if it is determined that “the petition was brought in good faith and there was a reasonable basis for the claim for which the petition was brought.”
DISCUSSION
I. The Standard of Review
4. The Vaccine Act provides that the Court of Federal Claims may reverse the decision of a special master if that decision is “arbitrary, capricious, an abuse of discretion, or otherwise not in accordance with law....”
5. These standards vary in application as well as degree of deference. Each standard applies to a different aspect of the judgment. Fact findings are reviewed by us, as by the Claims Court judge, under the arbitrary and capricious standard; legal questions under the “not in accordance with law” standard; and discretionary rulings under the abuse of discretion standard.
6. In this case, the facts are not in dispute. The issue before us on appeal is whether the special master‘s award of attorneys’ fees and costs was permissible under the Act. Because that is a legal question, we apply the “not in accordance with law” standard. Thus, we review the special master‘s award de novo to determine whether the Claims Court reached the proper conclusion.
II. The Statutory Scheme
8. The Act provides that if a petitioner proves his or her case by a preponderance of the evidence, “compensation” shall be awarded. See
9. As noted above, under the Vaccine Act even an unsuccessful petitioner may recover attorneys’ fees and costs. The attorneys’ fees provision of the Act provides as follows:
10. In awarding compensation on a petition filed under section 300aa-11 ... the special master or court shall also award as part of such compensation an amount to cover--
11. (A) reasonable attorneys’ fees, and
12. (B) other costs,
13. incurred in any proceeding on such petition. If the judgment of the United States Court of Federal Claims on such a petition does not award compensation, the special master or court may award an amount of compensation to cover petitioner‘s reasonable attorneys’ fees and other costs incurred in any proceeding on such petition if the special master or court determines that the petition was brought in good faith and there was a reasonable basis for the claim for which the petition was brought.
14.
III. Analysis
15. The Claims Court affirmed the special master‘s decision awarding attorneys’ fees and costs under the Act. On appeal, the government does not challenge the determination that the Saunders petition was brought in good faith and that there was a reasonable basis for petitioner‘s claim. Rather, the government argues that the Claims Court erred as a matter of law because
16. The linchpin of the government‘s argument is the proposition that, for purposes of the election requirements of
17. To begin with, the term “compensation” is used mainly in the Vaccine Act to mean payment for expenses incurred and losses suffered as a result of the administration of a vaccine. See
18. Secondly, it is a settled rule of statutory interpretation that a statute is to be construed in a way which gives meaning and effect to all of its parts. United States v. Nordic Village, Inc., 503 U.S. 30, 36 (1992) (“settled rule that a statute must, if possible, be construed in such fashion that every word has some operative effect“). The government‘s construction of the election provisions of the Act--that, as used therein, the term “compensation” encompasses both attorneys’ fees and costs and an award on the merits--does not give meaning and effect to another part of the statute. Specifically, the government ignores the fact that in the fees and costs provision of the Act, the term “compensation” has different meanings. As seen above,
20. We believe that our construction of the statute furthers the underlying purposes of the Act. The Act was intended to provide compensatory damages for vaccine-related injuries. Because this statutory scheme is somewhat unique in that it supplants, at least initially, the traditional tort law regime typically used to compensate such injuries, certain statutory provisions are necessary to make the scheme compatible with tort law under the federal system. For example, the election requirement of
21. A secondary purpose of the Act is to ensure that vaccine-injury claimants will have readily available a competent bar to prosecute their claims under the Act. This secondary purpose, which is effected by permitting the award of attorneys’ fees and costs both to prevailing and non-prevailing claimants, is present regardless of whether or not a claimant receives compensation for his or her injury, and whether or not the claimant elects to accept the judgment under the Act. Thus, it would frustrate the secondary purpose of the Act to limit the award of attorneys’ fees and costs only to cases in which an election to accept the judgment has been made. Moreover, in contrast to compensation under the Act for vaccine-related injuries, there is no danger that payment of attorneys’ fees and costs will result in a double payment. Rather, payment of attorneys’ fees and costs directly corresponds to costs incurred in prosecuting a claim under the Act. As such, the payment is independent of both any payment for the vaccine-related injury and any future costs incurred in bringing a subsequent civil action.
22. Finally, we note the principle of statutory construction that “a court should seek to avoid construing a statute in a way which yields an absurd result and should try to construe a statute in a way which is consistent with the intent of Congress.” Hellebrand, 999 F.2d at 1570-71. Taking the Vaccine Act as a whole and giving effect to all of its parts, the result the government urges, in the setting of a prospective case, yields a result which we do not believe Congress could have intended.
23. As seen above, if he or she wishes to avoid the $1,000 recovery limitation, a petitioner in a prospective case is required by statute to proceed under the Act before bringing a civil action in state or federal court, even though he or she may not want to proceed under the Act because of its limitations on recovery. See
24. The government argues that an unsuccessful petitioner must elect to accept the court‘s judgment in order to recover attorneys’ fees and costs. However, in a prospective case, an individual wishing to avoid the $1,000 recovery limitation is required by statute to proceed under the Act before bringing a claim in state or federal court. If one accepts the government‘s position, the result is that an individual in a prospective case is barred from recovering the attorneys’ fees and costs incurred in an action under the Act if he or she chooses not to accept the court‘s judgment, even though the individual may have had no desire to bring such an action in the first place, but was forced to do so because of the requirements of the Act. Put another way, as the government sees it, Congress intended to force a petitioner in a prospective case to incur attorneys’ fees and costs in the Court of Federal Claims and then to compel that petitioner to choose between recovering those fees and costs or foregoing the right to bring a claim in state or federal court. Absent clear language compelling it, we are not prepared to conclude that Congress intended such a result. At the least, if Congress had intended such a result, we believe that it would have made its intention clear in the statute. See United States v. International Business Machs. Corp., 892 F.2d 1006, 1009 (Fed.Cir.1989) (“Had Congress intended to make the exemption permanent, it knew how: it could and we believe would have used words of futurity....“).
25. For the foregoing reasons, we hold that petitioner‘s election to reject the judgment of the Claims Court on the merits of her claim did not bar petitioner from recovering the attorneys’ fees and costs incurred in her action under the Vaccine Act. Accordingly, the judgment of the Claims Court is
26. AFFIRMED.