Within weeks of its issuance, SCOTUS’s Sutter decision is already making an impact on other cases. Both the Eleventh Circuit and the D.C. Court of Appeals cite Sutter repeatedly in recent decisions that refuse to vacate arbitration awards. Of course, new decisions are not the only ones that reverberate: Concepcion, a 2011 decision, was
In American Express Co. v. Italian Colors Restaurant, a divided Supreme Court today reversed the Second Circuit and held that plaintiffs may not invalidate an arbitration agreement containing a class action waiver merely because proving their claims on an individual basis would cost many times more than their potential recovery. In doing so, Justice
Minnesota Senator Al Franken, among others, responded to the Supreme Court’s Concepcion decision by introducing a bill called the Arbitration Fairness Act of 2011 (S.987, also in the House as H.R. 1873) last May, which would legislatively nullify arbitration provisions in various types of agreements. The Senate Judiciary Committee heard two hours of testimony on
In April, the Supreme Court struck down a common law rule in California that declared most consumer arbitration agreements void if they prohibit classwide arbitration of claims, holding that it was preempted by the Federal Arbitration Act. AT&T Mobility, LLC v. Concepcion, 131S. Ct. 1740 ( 2011). In the last few weeks, two federal circuit