In the decade since the Supreme Court decided AT&T Mobility LLC v. Concepcion, 563 U.S. 333, 339 (2011) and American Express Co. v. Italian Colors Restaurants, 570 U.S. 228, 233 (2013), arbitrability has become a threshold...more
Seyfarth Synopsis: The second key trend from our 16th Annual Workplace Class Action Litigation Report involves rulings by the U.S. Supreme Court. Over the past few years, the Supreme Court has issued a number of rulings that...more
In Dorman v. Charles Schwab Corp., the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit held on August 20, 2019 that claims under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (“ERISA”) can generally be subject to mandatory...more
A three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit recently decided that Charles Schwab Corp. can require a proposed class action to arbitrate its claim that Schwab breached its fiduciary duties by including Schwab-affiliated...more
Is there such a thing as an arbitration joke? Here is a test. Two plaintiffs walk into a court, claiming that each was wrongfully terminated by a bank (UBS). The bank moves to compel arbitration by plaintiff one; and it moves...more
The Sixth Circuit just became the third federal court of appeals to hold that an arbitration provision requiring employees covered by the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) to arbitrate individually all employment-related...more
Within hours of Gretchen Carlson suing then-Fox News CEO Roger Ailes for sexual harassment, Ailes’ attorney responded that Carlson was “desperately attempting to litigate [her termination] in the press.” It didn’t take much...more
Today, the CFPB announced its proposed rule that would prohibit class action waivers in arbitration clauses in contracts governing consumer finance products. While the proposal does not include a complete ban on all...more
The Restoring Statutory Rights Act of 2016, sponsored by Democratic Senator Patrick Leahy, was sent to congressional committee on February 4, 2016 for consideration. The bill would place restrictions on companies’ use...more
Over the last decade, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a string of opinions with profound implications for the enforceability of arbitration provisions and class action waivers in consumer contracts. These decisions, the most...more
The late Justice Antonin Scalia was not the biggest fan of antitrust law. As he famously quipped during his Senate confirmation hearing: “In law school, I never understood [antitrust law]. I later found out, in reading the...more
Arbitration clauses are a common feature in a large part of my business litigation practice. They are generally enforceable under both federal and state statutes (e.g., the Federal Arbitration Act and the Tennessee Uniform...more
As the number of Fair Labor Standards Act lawsuits has grown, employers have started taking notice of the power a sizable class made up of numerous employees can command. Arbitration provisions – once the realm of...more
The U.S. Supreme Court recently denied a petition for certiorari that challenged a California Supreme Court decision carving out an exception to the federal high court’s recent holdings in AT&T Mobility LLC v. Concepcion and...more
Yesterday, the Supreme Court of the United States declined review of a state supreme court case that has sparked widespread flux in the landscape of class action arbitration waivers in California. In Iskanian v. CLS...more
In American Express Co. v. Italian Colors Restaurant, the Supreme Court confirmed what it had only hinted at two years earlier in AT&T Mobility, LLC v. Concepcion. In a holding authored by Justice Scalia, the Court made plain...more
The answer is nowhere near as simple as you might think. Everyone knows that a court is supposed to conduct a “rigorous analysis,” but what that means in practice is not quite as clear....more
Recent Supreme Court precedent has clearly reinforced the validity of contractual class action/arbitration waivers. In AT&T Mobility v. Concepcion, the Court made clear that class action waivers are enforceable, even if...more
As we discussed recently in our blog post, “President Obama Issues Two Executive Orders in 10-Day Period,” last week President Obama issued the Fair Pay and Safe Workplaces Executive Order. Under this order, federal...more
Alright, we all know in the wake of Italian Colors, Concepcion, and now many other cases that the presumption of arbitrability isn’t just a doctrine to recite in the manner of saying grace before invalidating an agreement,...more
In a variation on a familiar refrain, the Fourth Circuit recently upheld the enforceability of another arbitration provision under the Federal Arbitration Act (“FAA”) in Santoro v. Accenture Federal Services, LLC. This time,...more
I’ll admit, General Mills did not go that far. What they did, according to The New York Times was notify customers that if they downloaded a coupon, joined a forum or entered a sweepstakes, the customer would waive their...more
In the wake of the 2008 financial crisis, Congress passed significant financial system reform legislation, the Dodd-Frank Act, which created a new regulator of financial institutions, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau...more
Defining the power of arbitration agreements has been a hot topic at the federal and state levels for the past couple of years. In a recent post, we discussed two North Carolina Court of Appeals decisions that validated the...more
Executive Summary: The U.S. Supreme Court has vacated the decision of a California state court, which held that a trial court should apply the factors set out in the California Supreme Court's 2007 decision in Gentry v....more