Concept
The Demand as a Ceiling
Default judgment by the clerk and relief demanded
The Demand as a Ceiling
After a default, someone must still decide what the plaintiff receives, and Rule 54(c) caps that decision before it starts. A default judgment "must not differ in kind from, or exceed in amount, what is demanded in the pleadings."1 The sentence sets two limits. One governs kind: the judgment may grant only remedies of a type the complaint asked for. The other governs amount: the sum awarded may not pass the figure the complaint requested. Both limits use one yardstick, the pleading as it stood when the defendant chose silence, so the question is always what the plaintiff asked for at the outset and never what the plaintiff now wishes had been asked.
The cap follows from what a defendant is told. The summons served with the complaint warns that, if the defendant fails to respond, "judgment by default will be entered against you for the relief demanded in the complaint."2 The complaint is therefore the only document from which a defendant can learn what silence may cost, and Rule 54(c) keeps the warning true. A defendant who reads the demand and chooses not to answer may treat it as the worst case.
The rule speaks of a default judgment without regard to who enters it, so the ceiling binds the clerk and the court alike. It also works on two axes at once. A judgment within the dollar figure still fails if it grants a remedy the complaint never requested, and a judgment of the demanded kind still fails if it awards more than was asked. The rule's next sentence relaxes the demand requirement for every other final judgment, a contrast taken up under relief not demanded.3
No Different Kind of Relief
Kind refers to the category of remedy: money damages, an injunction (a court order to do or stop doing something), or a declaration of rights. Under most default rules, once a defendant defaults, the claimant cannot recover more than the amount demanded or a type of relief other than the one requested, yet the default still does not concede the claimant's right to the relief requested.4 The kind limit therefore draws a boundary around the remedies a court may consider, and the court decides what falls inside it.
The rule polices kind apart from amount because remedies differ in the burden they place on a defendant, and a defendant sizing up a complaint is weighing each one. A demand for money alone invites a calculation about debt. An injunction reaches future conduct and can require a defendant to give up property, as the copyright case below shows. A defendant who reads a demand for money and judges silence affordable has priced the risk in dollars. If the court could then add an order the complaint never mentioned, that defendant would have stayed silent in the face of a risk the pleading never disclosed.
The limit also runs the other way. A complaint that asked only for a declaration of rights cannot become a damages award through the defendant's silence, because payment is a different kind of remedy from a declaration, and a defendant who ignored a declaratory claim never weighed the risk of paying anything.
Lacey shows the permitted side. The complaint requested statutory damages under 17 U.S.C. § 504(c), attorney's fees and costs under § 505, and injunctive relief under §§ 502 and 503 that would bar further infringement and require Lacey to destroy all copies of sound recordings made in violation of the plaintiffs' rights.5 After Lacey failed to defend, the court awarded $6,000 in statutory damages and a permanent injunction.6 Both fell within categories the complaint had named. What separated those plaintiffs from the software firm was not the defendant's silence, which both faced, but the pleading: Lacey's complaint demanded an injunction before the default, and the firm's complaint did not.
A demand for a remedy opens the door to that remedy without guaranteeing it. The Lacey court reminded itself that, notwithstanding the default, "judgment may be granted only for such relief as may lawfully be granted upon the well-pleaded facts alleged in the complaint."7 The admitted facts do not even settle liability automatically. Whether they establish it is a question of law, and the court cannot enter a default judgment unless the complaint states a claim for relief, as if the defaulting party had filed a phantom Rule 12(b)(6) motion.8 Two separate questions therefore stand between a plaintiff and a non-monetary remedy. Rule 54(c) asks whether the pleadings demanded that kind of relief, and the court asks whether the pleaded facts justify it. On the injunction, the Lacey court did not treat the demand as enough. It found that Lacey was continuing her infringement through an online distribution system and had made no effort to defend, and it concluded that the plaintiffs had shown a strong likelihood of a continuing threat unless she was enjoined.9 A complaint that demanded the same injunction but pleaded a single completed act with no sign of recurrence would give the court far less to rest the order on.
No Greater Amount
The second limit is a number: a default judgment may not "exceed in amount" what the pleadings demand.11 The figure that controls is the one in the complaint, the ad damnum, meaning the damages the plaintiff demands as stated in the pleading. One court put the limit this way: if the court awards damages, the judgment may not be different in kind or exceed the amount prayed for in the demand for judgment.12 The same demand that bounds the kind of relief therefore bounds the dollars.
A defendant who reads a modest demand and decides that contesting it would cost more than it could save is acting on the warning the summons gave. A judgment above the pleaded figure would punish that calculation, and the figure would lose its value as a warning. The cap also closes off a temptation on the plaintiff's side. Without it, a plaintiff could inflate the claim after the defendant has gone silent and can no longer answer.
The demand restrains the court only from above. A default admits the facts alleged but not the plaintiff's right to the relief requested, and the court must still determine the amount of damages.13 The plaintiff must therefore prove all the damages sought, and those damages may not differ in kind from or exceed in amount what the pleadings demand.14 Where the court sets the amount, it does so at a hearing at which the plaintiff must prove damages, not liability. The ad damnum sets the ceiling without guaranteeing recovery of that amount, and the defendant may appear at the hearing and may even demand a jury trial on damages.15 Such a hearing may proceed like any other trial, though witnesses usually do not appear in person.16
One default case shows how far the demand can sit above the proof. The plaintiff demanded $5,000,000 in compensatory damages, and the court found it certain that no factfinder would award that sum. Even in a case where the verdict rested on lost business and emotional harm from a defamatory statement that a plastic surgeon had caused a person's death, the compensatory award was only one twentieth as large.17 The court counted the unrecoverable figure among the factors it weighed on whether to enter judgment at all, and a court may deny a default judgment altogether if it deems one inappropriate.18 The demand marked how far the court could go, and the proof marked how far it would. A plaintiff who reads the demand as the amount the silent defendant owes has confused the ceiling with the award.
The Lacey plaintiffs asked for the least the statute allowed: the minimum statutory damages for eight recordings, $750 each. The court noted that they had waived any claim to more and that § 504(c)(1) forbade a lesser award, so an evidentiary hearing would serve no purpose, and it awarded $6,000 without one.19 The award reached the limit of what was sought and did not pass it. Lacey and the $5,000,000 demand both involved silent defendants, and both judgments stayed within the demand. They differ in proof. A statute fixed the Lacey figure, while a claim no factfinder would credit stood behind the other.
The clerk's route reaches the same limit from the other side. On the plaintiff's request and an affidavit showing the amount due, the clerk must enter judgment for a sum certain, or a sum that can be made certain by computation, plus costs, against a defendant defaulted for not appearing who is neither a minor nor an incompetent person.20 That sum comes from the plaintiff's own claim, and Rule 54(c) bars the clerk from entering more than the pleadings demand. A defendant who removed the case from state court has appeared by filing the notice of removal, even if it later misses the deadline to answer, so judgment against that defendant is the court's to enter and not the clerk's.21
A court may also strike a defendant's answers and direct that a "default judgment" enter without fixing the amount. The court in the Chudasamas' suit against Mazda did this, noting that a jury trial would be needed to determine damages and directing Mazda to pay the plaintiffs' expenses, including attorneys' fees.22 The order disposed of the defense but left the amount to a jury. A defendant who defaults in the ordinary way keeps a similar opening on amount, since it may appear at the damages hearing and may even demand a jury trial on damages.23