Abortion and the death penalty — these are the issues that have come to represent the ideological divide on the Supreme Court; yet, another contentious subject has received considerable attention from the court (if not from the public): arbitration.
In recent years, the court has heard several cases each term defining when a claim must be arbitrated rather than litigated in court, and what issues are to be determined by an arbitrator or by the court. The Supreme Court has been split 5-4 in many of these cases, with the majority typically opening the door to broader availability of arbitration and greater powers of the arbitrator.
