united-states california civil-law civil-procedure federal-courts
Filed each actions at once, could you move the court to conclude one or more actions for relief before moving to other actions?
<p>18 U.S.C. 1915 (f)(1)</p>
<p>&quot;Judgment may be rendered for costs at the conclusion of the suit or action [...]&quot;</p>
<p>This strikes me as one action may be obtained summary of judgement or other forms of decisions, if any, before others do.</p>
<p>Is this possible? Typical? What are some of the main case laws governing any similar situations?</p>

<p>An &quot;action&quot; is a term of art that basically means a lawsuit with a particular case number.</p>
<p>Claims for relief within a single lawsuit with a single case number are not &quot;actions&quot; (even if none of the parties to the different claims overlap).</p>
<p>It isn't unheard of for there to be multiple civil actions pending at the same time regarding overlapping subject matter. But this is risky, because the first one to &quot;final judgment&quot; (something that has quite a technical definition) has &quot;res judicata&quot; effect that could be grounds for dismissal or summary resolution of all of the other lawsuits.</p>
<p>To prevent this from happening, the other side facing multiple lawsuits can move to consolidate all of them into one case (there are a couple of different way this happens depending on the procedural details).</p>
<p>Stays of one action by a judge knowing that other actions are pending are possible, but usually reserved for situations when motions to consolidate are pending.</p>
