Jackson, J., dissenting
appeal succeeds, the pro-arbitration party gets its wish and the dispute goes to arbitration.
Perhaps for those reasons, real-life parties do not agree with the majority that an interlocutory arbitrability appeal is pointless without an automatic stay. No stay was issued in this case, for example, yet Coinbase still pursued its interlocutory appeal. Nor did other parties stop bringing interlocutory arbitrability appeals in the Circuits that had interpreted §16 to impose no automatic stay.[1]
Yet this Court steps in to give the pro-arbitration party the additional right to an automatic stay that Congress withheld. Now, any defendant that devises a non-frivolous argument for arbitration can not only appeal, but also press pause on the case—leaving plaintiffs to suffer harm, lose evidence, and bleed dry their patience and funding in the meantime. To confer that power on a class of litigants, based on blanket judgments resolving competing policy concerns, is Congress’s domain, not ours. And where Congress is silent, the job of managing particular litigation, in light of the concrete circumstances presented, belongs to the judge closest to a case.
- ↑ For over a decade, the Second, Fifth, and Ninth Circuits have all held that a §16(a) appeal triggers no mandatory general stay. Motorola Credit Corp. v. Uzan, 388 F. 3d 39, 53–54 (CA2 2004); Britton v. Co-op Banking Group, 916 F. 2d 1405, 1412 (CA9 1990); Weingarten Realty Investors v. Miller, 661 F. 3d 904, 907–910 (CA5 2011). And those Circuits face no shortage of interlocutory §16(a) appeals. See, e.g., Palacios v. Alifine Dining, Inc., 2023 WL 2469765 (CA2, Mar. 13, 2023); Laurel v. Cintas Corp., 2023 WL 2363686 (CA9, Mar. 6, 2023); NATS, Inc. v. Radiation Shield Technologies, Inc., 2023 WL 2416160 (CA2, Mar. 9, 2023); Hill v. Xerox Bus. Servs., LLC, 59 F. 4th 457 (CA9 2023); Johnson v. Walmart Inc., 57 F. 4th 677 (CA9 2023); Noble Capital Fund Mgmt., LLC v. US Capital Global Inv. Mgmt., LLC, 31 F. 4th 333 (CA5 2022); Forby v. One Technologies, LP, 13 F. 4th 460 (CA5 2021); Soliman v. Subway Franchisee Adv. Fund Trust, Ltd., 999 F. 3d 828 (CA2 2021); Polyflow, LLC v. Specialty RTP, LLC, 993 F. 3d 295 (CA5 2021).
