Confusing Matters Relating to Arbitration in Pennsylvania (with W. W. Sturges)

Abstract

A review of the Pennsylvania decisions relating to arbitration under the arbitration statute of 1927 points up several issues which are of importance to those who may be concerned with arbitration in either commercial or labor controversies. Some of these issues result in part from frailties of draftsmanship of the statute and in part from views advanced by the Supreme Court in the course of litigation involving those frailties. Others have accrued more directly from the case law made by the Supreme Court without special reference to uncertainties of statutory text. The Supreme Court has varied from time to time in its expressions of its attitude and approach toward the statute and toward arbitration and arbitration agreements, leaving in doubt whether in a new case it will approach the statute and the arbitral process with purpose to facilitate their service as a legitimate servant of law administration or seek to restrict it.