Arbitration law’s “first principle” is “arbitration is a matter of consent, not coercion[,]” and class arbitration is no exception. (See, e.g., here.) In Jock v. Sterling Jewelers, Inc., 703 Fed.Appx. 15 (2d Cir. 2017) (summary order), the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit enforced that principle by vacating and remanding the district court’s judgment, which confirmed in part a class arbitration class certification award that purported to bind non-parties, that is, persons (other than named class representatives), who had not opted into the putative class.
Because the Second Circuit held in an earlier appeal, Jock v. Sterling Jewelers, Inc., 646 F.3d 113, 124 (2d Cir. 2011) (“Jock I”), that the “issue of whether the agreement permitted class arbitration was squarely presented to the Arbitrator,” see id., the district court concluded that holding was law of the case, and confirmed in part an award certifying a class that “included absent class members, i.e., employees other than the named plaintiffs and those who have opted into the class.” 703 Fed. Appx. at 17-18.
The Second Circuit vacated and remanded the judgment partially confirming the certification award because it purported to bind absent class members, who (because of their absence) could not have “squarely presented’ to the arbitrator the question whether the agreement authorized class procedures, let alone the issue of whether they should be deemed part of a class in a class arbitration to which they had not consented. See 703 Fed. Appx. at 16, 17-18.
While in Jock I the parties had “squarely presented to the arbitrator” the issue of whether the agreement “permitted class arbitration,” Jock I did not address the more “narrow question” “whether an arbitrator, who may decide … whether an arbitration agreement provides for class procedures because the parties `squarely presented’ it for decision, may thereafter purport to bind non-parties to class procedures on this basis.” Id. at 18. The answer to that question is “no”— as Associate Justice Samuel A. Alito, Jr. suggested in his concurring opinion in Oxford Health Plans LLC v. Sutter, 133 S. Ct. 2064, 2071-72 (2013) (Alito, J., concurring), and as the Second Circuit confirmed in Jock II. See 703 Fed. Appx. at 16, 17-18.
Photo Acknowledgements:
All photos used in the text portion of this post are licensed from Yay Images and are subject to copyright protection under applicable law. The Yay Images abbreviations of the photographer’s name for each of the two images are:
Image 1: CartoonResource
Image 2: stuartmiles
Tags: Absent Class Members, Associate Justice Samuel A. Alito, Class Arbitration, Class Arbitration Procedures, Consent not Coercion, Consent to Class Arbitration, Exceeding Powers, First Principle, Jock v. Sterling Jewelers, Oxford Health Plans LLC v. Sutter, Procedural Arbitrability, Rights and Obligations of Non-Parties, Rights and Obligations of Third Parties, Stolt Nielsen S.A. v. Animalfeeds Int'l Corp.
