Promotion Of Arbitration In The 21st Century

While pundits complain about the United States Supreme Court's diminishing docket, one area of law seems to have increased in popularity with the justices: arbitration law, and in particular the Federal Arbitration Act (FAA). By the end of the current term, the Supreme Court will have issued 50 opinions related to the act since its passage in 1925. The Court handed down 28 of those decisions before 2000 and 22 after 2000, issuing 15 of those 22 decisions since 2008, including the two currently pending before the Court, Am. Express Co. v. Italian Colors Rest., No. 12-133, and Oxford Health Plans LLC v. Sutter, No. 12-135. That means that the Court will have gone from issuing an average of less than one Federal Arbitration Act-related ruling every other year in the 20th century to approximately two each year in the 21st century, averaging three each year since 2008. The Court has a particularly arbitration-heavy 2012–2013 term with three arbitration-related cases on the