Read this decision by the Supreme Court and understand what it means. Any company and possibly any employer can insert a boilerplate arbitration agreement into any contract and thereby void the ability of consumers and employees to enforce their legal rights - essentially eliminating the reality of all rights dependent on plaintiff resort to the courtroom for enforcement. In other decisions, the Supreme Court has allowed arbitrators to an amazing degree to disregard the existing law in making their decisions.
In this 5-4 decision, the Jim Crow Supreme Court is essentially eliminating the ability of any state government to pass any consumer or (possibly) employee protections that matter for any person unable to reject the boilerplate contracts they must deal with every day. Forget civil rights protections, forget consumer protections, forget sexual harassment protections- they all can disappear into the mow of compulsory arbitration.
I kept qualifying how this might effect employment arbitration, since it is less clear so far if employment arbitration can be imposed as easily as consumer arbitration. There is a case coming up this term on the issue and if that goes the wrong way, bye-bye most employment rights.
One thing we will need is a national movement to change federal law to void arbitration agreements when they violate such employment or consumer rights. As with the denial of the right to vote, this Supreme Court is on the road to gutting every fundamental access to rights for the poor and excluded.
God damn right the 5-4 split on the Supreme Court matters. Those who doubt it are just plain ignorant.
-- Nathan Newman
December 11, 2000 Consumer Claim Arbitration Upheld By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Filed at 10:49 a.m. ET
WASHINGTON (AP) -- A divided Supreme Court ruled Monday that the hidden cost of seeing a complaint through the process of arbitration is not enough to void an arbitration agreement and allow a disgruntled consumer to take the issue to court.
By a 5-4 vote, the justices decided against Larketta Randolph, an Alabama woman whose complaint began when she disputed a $15 charge in her mobile-home financing agreement.
A federal judge dismissed Randolph's 1996 suit against Green Tree Financial Corp. of Opelika, Ala., because in signing the original contract, Randolph agreed an arbitrator would resolve any disputes.
The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta gave the case new life last year, saying Green Tree didn't disclose the potential costs of arbitration when it signed the agreement with Randolph.
In the Supreme Court, the conservative and center-right blocs voted to reject Randolph's claim.
``The 'risk' that Randolph will be saddled with prohibitive costs is too speculative to justify the invalidation of an arbitration agreement,'' Chief Justice William Rehnquist wrote for the majority, which also included Justices Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas, Sandra Day O'Connor and Anthony Kennedy.
Writing for the moderate-to-liberal faction, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said she would have vacated the appeals court decision and sent it back for further consideration.
Ginsburg questioned whether Randolph should have to prove that the court system was her only option, ``or that she should be required to submit to arbitration without knowing how much it will cost her.''
``As I see it, the court has reached out prematurely to resolve the matter in the lender's favor,'' Ginsburg wrote.
The court also found that the appeals court had jurisdiction in the matter, an authority the lender had questioned.
The American Arbitration Association, the nation's largest dispute resolution provider, filed a brief with the court that argued against ending arbitration in consumer business contracts. The association said it limits consumer fees to $125 in arbitration cases valued under $10,000, and allows consumers to opt out of arbitration and file a lawsuit instead.
The case is Green Tree Financial Corp.-Alabama v. Randolph, 99-1235.
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