In re Wholesale Grocery Products Antitrust Litigation (Eighth Circuit)

The plaintiffs in this case argued that requiring them to arbitrate their federal antitrust claims on an individual basis would effectively preclude them from vindicating those claims, given the expense of pursuing such claims individually. On behalf of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, we filed an amicus brief arguing that this is not a permissible basis for refusing to enforce the plaintiffs’ arbitration agreements, because neither the Federal Arbitration Act nor the federal antitrust laws permit courts to invalidate arbitration agreements based on a policy concern that individual proceedings might not be cost-effective, and that the plaintiffs had failed to show that it would in fact be cost-prohibitive for them to proceed individually, because plaintiffs have ready access to a variety of informal means to pool resources and share any common litigation costs. The U.S. Supreme Court subsequently adopted our position in American Express Co. v. Italian Colors Restaurant, 133 S. Ct. 2304 (2013).