Is Local 10 entitled to an attorney's fee for the time spent on its LMRDA claims?

Local 10 argues that since we reversed the jury's award of damages to the plaintiffs on their LMRDA claims they are not entitled to an attorney's fee for the trial time spent on those claims, including the two on which they prevailed. We disagree. Our reversal was based on the fact that the damage award had been founded in part upon the erroneous theory that suspension of a member's right to attend meetings was an improper disciplinary sanction and in part on the paucity of evidence of mental or emotional distress attributable to the denial of due process. We recognized, however, that in any event plaintiffs might have recovered nominal damages as a matter of right under Carey v. Piphus, supra, 435 U.S. at 266-67, 98 S.Ct. at 1053-54, for Local 10's deprivation of the plaintiffs' due process rights. Regardless of the errors in assessment of compensatory and punitive damages, the wrongfulness of Local 10's conduct continued to play an important role in the trial and those findings of the jury with respect to its misconduct that were not reversed by us on appeal were clearly of benefit to the union and its membership regardless of the amount of provable damage to plaintiffs.