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78 Cal. 449

McIntyre v. Trautner

California Supreme Court

Decided March 22, 1889

California Supreme Court · decided 1889-03-22

order of the Superior Court of the city and county of San Francisco striking out a certain item from a cost-bill. The facts are stated in the opinion of the court.

Relies on Rapp v. Spring Valley Gold Co. · McIntyre v. Trautner

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1889-03-22

How this case has been cited

Cited by 17 later decisions — most recently March 1967

4 federal appellate · 12 state decisions

40188918901900191019201930194019501960decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

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Works, J.

¶1The appellant brought this action against the respondent to foreclose a mechanic’s lien for plumbing work. The court rendered judgment of nonsuit against him. He appealed to this court, and the case was reversed and remanded for a new trial. (McIntyre v. Trautner, 63 Cal. 429.) Upon the return of the case to the court below he filed his cost-bill, including as one of the items of costs the sum of two hundred dollars for his attorney’s fees in the supreme court. The court, on motion of the respondent, made an order striking out and disallowing this item of costs. Subsequently the case proceeded, and there was finding and judgment in favor of the respondent on the merits.

¶2•• This appeal is from the order striking out the item of costs above mentioned.

¶3The appellant contends that as he was successful in *450this court, he was entitled to his attorney’s fees for services rendered here, and in support of this contention cites Rapp v. Spring Valley Gold Co., 74 Cal. 532.

¶4The case relied upon holds, and we think correctly, that the attorney’s fees are not a part of the costs, but are, under the code, an incident to the foreclosure of the lien. This being the case, there can be no recovery for attorney’s fees unless the plaintiff succeeds in his foreclosure proceeding. The court below having found against hinvon the merits, the lien, which is the basis upon which the right to recover the attorney’s fees must rest, is gone, and the right to such attorney’s fees must 'go with it. The fact that he was successful in the supreme court cannot affect the question. The final determination that the appellant had no lien was an adjudication of the controlling question, and was decisive of the point made on this appeal.

¶5Order affirmed.

¶6Paterson, J., and Beatty, C, J., concurred.

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