Is a postjudgment order denying attorney fees and costs appealable?

4 Appealable postjudgment orders include both those granting affirmative relief and those denying it. (See Gilman v. Contra Costa County (1857) 8 Cal. 52, 57.) It is true that on occasion an order granting a particular motion may be appealable while an order denying the same motion may not be, or vice versa. For example, this court noted in Wood v. Peterson Farms Co. (1931) 214 Cal. 94, 98, 3 P.2d 922, that although an order denying relief from default in the preparation of a reporter's transcript was appealable because it had "the effect of precluding an appellant from presenting his case on appeal," an order granting relief from default would not be appealable, presumably because it was not a final determination of the rights of the parties and would be appealable as part of the later appellate proceedings. There is, however, no parallel distinction to be made between an order granting attorney fees and an order denying them. In either case the resulting determination is final; in neither case would the ruling become appealable as part of later proceedings.

5 We note in addition that in Fulton v. Fulton (1934) 220 Cal. 726, 729, 32 P.2d 634, this court described--although without analysis, and with no reference to any effect on, or relationship to, the judgment--a postjudgment order denying attorney fees and costs on appeal as an appealable order not subject to review on appeal from the judgment.

6 Given our holding that the order is appealable as an order made after a judgment, we need not consider the alternate ground suggested by the plaintiff: that the order is appealable as "an order which determines a matter collateral to the main action ... [as well as] severable from the general objective of the litigation and ... a decision thereon determines finally the rights of the parties in relation to the collateral matter, leaving no further judicial action to be taken in regard to that matter." ( Henneberque v. City of Culver City, supra, 172 Cal.App.3d 837, 841, 218 Cal.Rptr. 704.)