arbitration | Judiciary.org

Supreme Court

Courts may not “make up” new procedural rules to favor arbitration

In a series of decisions, the Supreme Court has insisted that the Federal Arbitration Act requires courts to put arbitration contracts on “equal footing” with other kinds of contracts. These decisions have often favored companies seeking to enforce arbitration agreements, rejecting rules that give employees or consumers a way out from contract clauses requiring them to arbitrate their disputes on an individual basis. But Monday’s unanimous decision in Morgan v. Sundance clarifies that the equal-footing rule works both ways. … Read the rest

Supreme Court

Justices to consider California’s private-attorney-general exception to arbitration clause

The last few decades have witnessed the working out in several cases of a sustained disagreement between the Supreme Court and California legislators and judges. The Supreme Court has taken the view that the Federal Arbitration Act compels the enforcement, in state and federal courts, of pre-dispute arbitration agreements. Accordingly, the justices have rejected every effort to undermine the capacious application of those agreements to shift disputes between businesses and employees or customers from courts to arbitrators. California, acting … Read the rest

Supreme Court

Are airline cargo loaders engaged in interstate commerce? The answer has high stakes for forced arbitration.

Like many cases involving the Federal Arbitration Act, Southwest Airlines Co. v. Saxon began with an employment dispute: Southwest employee Latrice Saxon believed she was owed overtime pay. On behalf of herself and her fellow ramp-agent supervisors, Saxon filed a complaint under federal wage-and-hour law in federal court. Southwest responded that Saxon’s case should be dismissed because she was bound by an arbitration agreement, which was enforceable under the FAA. Similar arguments routinely succeed in employment cases – but … Read the rest