Appealing Arbitration Decisions

Welcome to 2020!

I hope that you all had a safe and rejuvenating holiday season.  A new decade brings us plenty of new opportunities for thrilling arbitration news and developments!

But, up first, more on class arbitrability.  I know.  I know.  So last decade.  But trust me, this is a case you want to keep

The Fifth Circuit just deepened (and confused) a Circuit split over the question of who decides whether an arbitration agreement permits class proceedings.  See 20/20 Communications, Incorporated v. Crawford, 2019 WL 3281412 (5th Cir. July 22, 2019).

Liz has written about the split herehere, and here.  (You might also recall

So, remember when we talked about Just How Small the Bullseye Is for Challenging a Delegation Clause a few weeks ago?  Apparently, the target is small but not necessarily as unhittable as I suggested.

You might recall that in that earlier post we were looking at a Missouri Supreme Court decision, State Ex Rel. Newberry

The Sixth Circuit just reminded us all that a forum selection provision identifying courts where any lawsuit may be filed doesn’t necessarily negate an arbitration provision.

In White v. ACell, Inc., 2019 WL 2929933 (6th Cir. July 8, 2019), an employee had entered into two separate agreements related to his employment.  One called for

This week, we’ll get to the nitty gritty of a topic that can be extremely relevant to litigators: the law applicable to determine the preclusive effect of an arbitral award.

If something’s been arbitrated, it generally cannot be relitigated. In other words, arbitral awards usually have preclusive effect.  There’s not much controversy about this much.

My students are sometimes surprised to learn that statutory rights are, with a handful of very minor exceptions, fully arbitrable.  That surprise often turns to indignation when they read Justice Scalia’s majority opinion in American Express Co. v. Italian Colors Restaurant, 133 S. Ct. 2304 (2013), and realize that this is true even absent