Supreme Court Hears Case on Federal Courts’ Powers to Confirm Arbitration Awards
By Sasha Hill and Russ Bleemer
The U.S. Supreme Court appears ready to broaden the powers of federal courts regarding their ability to confirm or vacate arbitration awards under the Federal Arbitration Act. In this morning's arguments, the justices had difficulty with interrupting subsequent federal court jurisdiction over awards where a case already has been the subject of a federal court litigation stay.
The dry subject of federal court jurisdiction covered this morning in Jules v. Andre Balazs Properties, No. 25-83 (Supreme Court docket page available at https://bit.ly/4qZsL0z) is a fundamental part of the life of litigators, and an essential area of attention for those seeking to enforce an arbitration award.
Until today’s arguments, litigants seeking confirmation or vacature of an award under the Federal Arbitration Act Sections 9 and 10 needed to satisfy federal court jurisdiction requirements—diversity, or amount-in-question, which has been $75,000.
But respondent Andre Balazs Properties—the owner of Hollywood’s Chateau Marmont, which was a defendant in the employment discrimination case that evolved to an arbitration matter at the nation's top Court—won in lower courts, confirming its award against its former employee based on continuing jurisdiction.
The Court appears ready to head that way despite the petitioner-former employee's arguments that the four-year-old Supreme Court decision in Badgerow v. Walters, 596 U.S. 1 (2022) (available at https://bit.ly/4cKK1lt), which held that federal courts may exercise jurisdiction to confirm or vacate an arbitration award only if there exists a clear, independent jurisdictional basis on the face of the dispute, should control the case and require a separate court action for confirmation.
The petitioner’s attorney, Adam G. Unikowsky, a partner in the Washington, D.C., office of Jenner & Block, had a tough time on the practical effects of his case asking for a separate, federal court action under FAA Sections 9 and 10 where a federal court case already was filed and a stay of litigation was issued.
“Don’t you think there's something odd about that?” asked Justice Clarence Thomas at the outset of Unikowsky’s argument.
“I’m having trouble understanding your lawsuit,” said Justice Sonia Sotomayor soon after, adding “Why isn’t this just a motion to confirm . . . ?”
Echoing Justice Thomas, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson said closure in the case from another court rather than where jurisdiction had been held on the stay motion “seems very odd,” and emphasized Thomas’s point that Unikowsky’s client had requested the federal court stay to begin the proceedings.
Then Justice Brett Kavanaugh said that the petitioner-employee’s insistence on bouncing between state or federal court for proper jurisdiction on award confirmation depending on whether the case is original or diversity jurisdiction “seems like an odd result.” Justice Neil Gorsuch piggybacked on Kavanaugh's question with the same skepticism.
On the other hand, Daniel L. Geyser, a partner in the Dallas office of Haynes and Boone who represents the hotel chain-respondent, emphasized that Badgerow did not have a previous action in federal court. Geyser spent a chunk of his argument explaining his client’s alternative "anchor" jurisdiction theories—that the case carried federal court jurisdiction under FAA Sections 9 and 10 precisely because of the FAA Sec. 3 stay, and that principles of ancillary jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. 1367, “Supplemental Jurisdiction” a 1990 law covering “Judiciary and Judicial Procedure” meant the action in federal court confirming his client's award was valid.
The second FAA action, either confirmation or a move to vacate the award, argued Geyser, “is a contractual resolution of the claim that was pending,” not a new federal court action requiring diversity or original jurisdiction.
The 28 U.S.C. 1367 analysis was a part of today’s arguments because otherwise, the confirmation or move to overturn an arbitration award would go to a state court, which was the Badgerow result, where there was no previous FAA Sec. 3 federal court matter as a potential jurisdictional anchor. Geyser sought the Sec. 1367 supplemental jurisdiction help for his argument as an equal alternative to the Court adopting the jurisdictional anchor approach, as Jules involves both state and federal claims.
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The precise issue presented in Jules is whether a federal court that initially exercises jurisdiction and then stays a case pending arbitration maintains jurisdiction over a post-arbitration Federal Arbitration Act Section 9 or 10 application, where jurisdiction would otherwise be lacking.
In Jules, a court first exercised jurisdiction in the employment discrimination suit filed by Petitioner Adrian Jules, a former employee at the Chateau Marmont. The Southern New York U.S. District Court, fielding both California and New York claims--in a messy procedural case that included periods in which Jules declined to participate, according to court papers--stayed litigation in the case pending arbitration under FAA Sec. 3.
Later, the same New York federal district court was asked to confirm or vacate an arbitration award in the case. It backed the award, and the Second U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals confirmed. Adrian Jules v. Andre Balazs Properties, et al., Nos. 23-1253(L), 23-1283 (consol.) (Apr. 25, 2025) (summary order) (available at https://bit.ly/4bIAF7R).
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Respondents' attorney Daniel Geyser opened his case by arguing that the original plaintiff was making the arbitration and litigation processes more complicated. He said that his clients "are simply asking to go back to the same court to enter judgment and dismiss Petitioner's case, without having to bifurcate these proceedings, file new state law litigation, and endure a parallel federal appeal, and chase down Petitioner to finally bring this case to a close."
Early in his argument, the Court worked with Geyser on the “common nucleus of operative act,” a case-driven standard that would allow Sec. 1367 to supply supplemental jurisdiction for the Jules award confirmation move.
Justice Elena Kagan asked about the circumstances of an FAA Sec. 9 request to confirm and its interrelationship with Sec. 1367 of the Judiciary Act, and said that it was a different action than the FAA Sec. 3 request for a stay. Geyser countered, "The arbitration award is an affirmative defense in the case," meaning it was part of the Sec. 3 request to stay the litigation and proceed in ADR. Therefore, he added in arguing for continuing jurisdiction, "It's hard to see how something can be an affirmative defense to claim in the case without being related to that case."
Geyser suggest another way that Court the deal with the claim. "Another analog," he said, "is just to say this is the federal directive on how a court decides what to do when the claim that's pending before it is now settled." Geyser conceded under questioning by Justice Amy Coney Barrett that the FAA continuing jurisdiction argument was more like original federal jurisdiction under 28 U.S. Code § 1331.
Justice Gorsuch clarified Geyser's alternatives: "[Y]ou've laid out two paths for us, one, the supplemental jurisdiction path, reliant on a statute that could never be accused of being overly precise. The other would be the original jurisdiction path." Gorsuch joked that Geyser would like both, but when pressed for a preference, Geyser said, "[Y]ou could say it's part of the original jurisdiction. That's just a very easy way to resolve it. We're in the same pending case. We're trying to dispose of the original claims."
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In his rebuttal, Jules' attorney Adam Unikowsky returned to the arbitration practice points the Court had worked throughout the course of the 55-minute session. "The money judgment against Petitioner," he argued, "which is the real practical effect of confirming this award, is not resolution of the original claim. It's transforming the parties' agreement to adjudicate this in a contractual method into a federal judgment. That's why I think extra jurisdiction is needed."
Jules' was sanctioned for being uncooperative in the arbitration, which included sanctions against his attorney, and which totaled more than $34,000.
Unikowsky added that the practical effects of the process he advocated for weren't any different than parallel state and federal court litigation paths.
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Earlier, also on the nuts and bolts of arbitration practice, the Court had discussed with both sides why the FAA Sec. 9 confirmation move should or shouldn't merely be considered equivalent to a litigation motion, under the circumstances where there had been earlier federal court actions. Unikowsky argued that the case should be dismissed after the FAA Sec. 3 action, and Sec. 9 should be subject to standard federal court jurisdictional requirements.
Andre Balasz Properties' attorney Daniel Geyser addressed the point when he opened his argument. "A federal court already vested with original jurisdiction has obvious power to hear FAA motions in that pending action," he said. "There's no need to ask if there is a redundant basis for original jurisdiction because jurisdiction already exists and any FAA motion falls squarely within the Court's supplemental jurisdiction."
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Adam Unikowsky had also insisted that the Court shouldn't convert a employment breach-of-contract suit on its merits into a judgment without a full jurisdictional test, nor should it look at the confirmation request as the equivalent of a consent decree, which by definition has a higher degree of court involvement than an arbitration award.
At the end of his main argument, Unikowsky strained on a practice point. He said, "[I]f I am advising a client and the client says we're about to arbitrate and we might need down the road to file an application to confirm or vacate the award, and the client says, 'I'd rather be in federal court,' in every case, I would say let's go to federal court."
Justice Sotomayor appeared surprised. "You know, I've practiced a lot of arbitration law," she said, concluding, "I don't know a client who ever said that to me."
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The transcript for Jules v. Andre Balazs Properties can be downloaded on the U.S. Supreme Court website here. The audio can be streamed and downloaded, and the transcript can be viewed here.
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Hill is the CPR Institute’s 2025-2026 academic year intern from the Howard University School of Law ADR Program, where she is a second-year student in Washington, D.C. Bleemer edits Alternatives to the High Cost of Litigation for the CPR Institute.
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