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Re: my3sons87 post# 384351

Wednesday, 04/23/2014 5:12:20 PM

Wednesday, April 23, 2014 5:12:20 PM

Post# of 432451
my3sons: Based on the Solicitor General's brief to the Supreme Court, I am not sure that a District Court's would not take action to terminate the case because of an arbitration claim

The article that dndodd posted regarding the Supreme Court’s action on LG’s case contained the following quote from the Solictor General’s brief:

“Although the Federal Circuit erred both in asserting jurisdiction and in its decision on the merits, those errors were not of sufficient legal or practical importance to warrant this Court's review,”

The “decision on the merits” pertained to CAFC’s finding that LG’s claim as to arbitrability was in fact “wholly groundless”. While we all agree with that determination, apparently the Solictor General did not. The following are the Solictor General’s comments on that issue, from his brief:

The court of appeals also erred in holding that petitioners’ arbitrability argument was “wholly groundless.” In Qualcomm Inc. v. Nokia Corp., 466 F.3d 1366 (Fed. Cir. 2006), the court stated that the “wholly groundless” inquiry was intended to “pre-vent[] a party from asserting any claim at all, no mat-ter how divorced from the parties’ agreement, to force an arbitration,” and should not be used to “invade the province of the arbitrator.” Id. at 1373-1374 & n.5. In this case, however, the court of appeals did not view petitioners’ argument in favor of arbitrability, which was based on an interpretation of the language of the relevant contract, to be “divorced from the parties’ agreement.” Id. at 1373 n.5. Rather, the court reject-ed petitioners’ interpretation of the agreement as not “plausible.” Pet. App. 21a. In so holding, the court misapplied the “wholly groundless” standard and invaded the province of the arbitrator. “

snip

“The question whether petitioners’ arbitrability argument was “wholly groundless” is narrow and case-specific. For the reasons stated above, Section 337(c) cases presenting such an issue are unlikely to arise frequently. And petitioners do not challenge the Federal Circuit’s use of the “wholly groundless” standard in this context, or even the description of that standard in Qualcomm, the Federal Circuit deci-sion that first adopted it. See, e.g., Pet. 26-30, 32. Indeed, they agreed below that Qualcomm supplied the proper test, and the court of appeals “assume[d]” its applicability on that basis. See Pet. App. 20a n.11.4
Rather, petitioners simply challenge the court of appeals’ application of the “wholly groundless” stand-ard to the facts of this case. The court of appeals appears to have looked somewhat more closely at the contract at issue, and to have given somewhat less leeway to the arbitrator, than it had previously sug-gested was appropriate. See Qualcomm, 466 F.3d at 1374 (“On remand, in undertaking the ‘wholly ground-less’ inquiry, the district court should look to the scope of the arbitration clause and the precise issues that the moving party asserts are subject to arbitra-tion.”). That error, however, involves no important and recurring question of law appropriate for this Court’s resolution. See Sup. Ct. R. 10.”
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