SCOTUS Issues Amex v. Italian Colors Decision on Arbitration

The Supreme Court of the United States just issued its decision in American Express v. Italian Colors, Inc., here  The syllabus of the Court summarizes the decision as follows:

The FAA does not permit courts to invalidate a contractual waiver of class arbitration on the ground that the plaintiff’s cost of individually arbitrating a federal statutory claim exceeds the potential recovery. Pp. 3–10. (a) The FAA reflects the overarching principle that arbitration is a matter of contract. See Rent-A-Center, West, Inc. v. Jackson, 561 U. S. ___, ___. Courts must “rigorously enforce” arbitration agreements according to their terms, Dean Witter Reynolds, Inc. v. Byrd, 470 U. S. 213, 221, even for claims alleging a violation of a federal statute, unless the FAA’s mandate has been “ ‘overridden by a contrary congressional command,’ ” CompuCredit Corp. v. Greenwood, 565 U. S. ___, ___. Pp. 3–4. (b) No contrary congressional command requires rejection of the class-arbitration waiver here. The antitrust laws do not guarantee an affordable procedural path to the vindication of every claim, see Rodriguez v. United States, 480 U. S. 522, 525–526, or “evince an intention to preclude a waiver” of class-action procedure, Mitsubishi Motors Corp. v. Soler-Chrysler-Plymouth, Inc., 473 U. S. 614, 628. Nor does congressional approval of Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 23 establish an entitlement to class proceedings for the vindication of statutory rights. The Rule imposes stringent requirements for certification that exclude most claims, and this Court has rejected the assertion that the class-notice requirement must be dispensed with because the “prohibitively high cost” of compliance would “frustrate[plaintiff’s] attempt to vindicate the policies underlying the antitrust” laws, Eisen v. Carlisle & Jacquelin, 417 U. S. 156, 167–168, 175–176. Pp. 4–5. (c) The “effective vindication” exception that originated as dictum in Mitsubishi Motors Corp. v. Soler Chrysler-Plymouth, Inc., 473 U. S. 614, also does not invalidate the instant arbitration agreement. The exception comes from a desire to prevent “prospective waiver of a party’s right to pursue statutory remedies,” id., at 637, n. 19; but the fact that it is not worth the expense involved in proving a statutory remedy does not constitute the elimination of the right to pursue that remedy. Cf. Gilmer v. Interstate/Johnson Lane Corp., 500 U. S. 20, 32; Vimar Seguros y Reaseguros, S. A. v. M/V Sky Reefer, 515 U. S. 528, 530, 534. AT&T Mobility LLC v. Concepcion, 563 U. S. ___, all but resolves this case. There, in finding that a law that conditioned enforcement of arbitration on the availability of class procedure interfered with fundamental arbitration attributes, id., at ___, the Court specifically rejected the argument that class arbitration was necessary to prosecute claims “that might otherwise slip through the legal system,” id., at ___. Pp. 5–9.