Trial Lawyers vs. Chamber of Commerce: Battle over Arbitration

Enforcement of arbitration clauses, especially in the context of form contracts presented by businesses to consumers and employees, has long been a battle between trial lawyers and business.  

Here is a big recent document by the trial lawyers' American Association for Justice.    Here is the US Chamber of Commerce's side of the story, from its Institute for Legal Reform.

I tend to agree with the Chamber as evident in this congressional testimony (video), law review article and policy analysis for the Cato Institute.

Domain-Name Arbitration in the Arbitration-Law Context: Consent to, and Fairness in, the UDRP

Domain-Name Arbitration in the Arbitration-Law Context: Consent to, and Fairness in, the UDRP

This Article begins by introducing the domain-name arbitration system. This Article provides what may be the first sustained analysis of consent issues in domain-name arbitration. It also assesses the fairness of domain-name arbitration.

Arbitration Clauses, Jury-Waiver Clauses and Other Contractual Waivers of Constitutional Rights

Consenting to a contract containing an arbitration clause or a jury-waiver clause alienates or waives the Seventh Amendment jury-trial right in federal court. The standards of consent in arbitration law, however, tend to be lower than the standards of consent in the federal caselaw governing jury-waiver clauses. The Federal Arbitration Act (FAA) requires courts to apply contract law's standards of consent to arbitration agreements, while certain commentators argue that courts are instead constitutionally required to apply the higher standards of consent (knowing consent) found in the caselaw governing jury-waiver clauses. This article responds to these commentators and argues that the FAA's contract-law standards of consent are constitutional.