Can You Hear Them Now?

Can You Hear Them Now?
The Supreme Court reads the fine print on your cell phone contract.
By Dahlia Lithwick

Every Supreme Court reporter waits—often in vain and for decades—for a case like AT&T Mobility v. Concepcion. It is a case at the white-hot epicenter of three almost completely inexplicable doctrines: federal preemption, federal arbitration policy, and class action. (I can hear the clamor now from all of you who want me to skip right ahead to the juicy arbitration explanations.) Phrases like contracts of adhesion, exculpatory provisions, ex ante, nonclassable claims, and obstacle preemption fill up the Supreme Court chambers today, like some kind of hideous jargon spill in the Gulf of Mexico. At some point the phrase post ante was uttered, which I don't think even makes sense. Indeed the only moment in the entire hourlong argument that might have happened in Technicolor came with Justice Stephen Breyer's baffling metaphor involving a "9,000-foot cow." And even he seemed to be confused about what that had to do with preemption, arbitration, or cellular telephones.

But sometimes, the most technical, eye-glazing cases can lead to the biggest changes in the legal landscape. Today's case could profoundly affect anyone in America who has a cell phone contract, a credit card, an employment contract, or aspirations of landing a job at Hooters.

Increasingly, many such contracts, including the cell phone contract at issue in this case, contain arbitration clauses. And the Roberts court has really loved arbitration clauses of late. In this particular case, the arbitration clause between AT&T and its customers provided that both parties to the agreement could bring claims only as individuals, not as part of a class action.

http://www.slate.com/id/2274212/