Badgerow v. Walters

Summary

Federal jurisdiction in a petition to compel arbitration under Section 4 of the Federal Arbitration Act is determined by “looking through” the petition to the jurisdictional basis of the “underlying substantive controversy,” Vaden v. Discover Bank, 556 U. S. 49, 62, but that approach does not apply to petitions to confirm or vacate arbitral awards under Sections 9 and 10 of the FAA.

Text

PRELIMINARY PRINT 
Volume 596 U. S. Part 1 
Pages 1–35 
OFFICIAL REPORTS 
OF 
THE SUPREME COURT 
March 31, 2022 
REBECCA A. WOMELDORF 
reporter of decisions 
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NOTICE: This preliminary print is subject to formal revision before 
the bound volume is published. Users are requested to notify the Reporter 
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CASES ADJUDGED 
IN THE 
SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES 
AT 
OCTOBER TERM, 2021 
BADGEROW v. WALTERS et al. 
certiorari to the united states court of appeals for 
the fth circuit 
No. 20–1143. Argued November 2, 2021—Decided March 31, 2022 
The Federal Arbitration Act authorizes a party to an arbitration agree-
ment to petition a federal court for various forms of relief. But the 
Act's authorization of such petitions does not itself create the subject-
matter jurisdiction necessary for a federal court to resolve them. 
Rather, the federal court must have an “independent jurisdictional 
basis” to do so. Hall Street Associates, L. L. C. v. Mattel, Inc., 552 U. S. 
576, 582. In Vaden v. Discover Bank, 556 U. S. 49, this Court assessed 
whether there was a jurisdictional basis to decide an FAA Section 4 
petition to compel arbitration by means of examining the parties' under-
lying dispute. The Court reasoned that specifc language in Section 4 
instructed a federal court to “look through” the petition to the “underly-
ing substantive controversy.” Id., at 62. If the dispute underlying a 
Section 4 petition falls within the court's jurisdiction—for example, by 
presenting a federal question—then the court may rule on the petition 
to compel arbitration. 
In this case, the question presented is whether that same “look-
through” approach to jurisdiction applies to applications to confrm or 
vacate arbitral awards under Sections 9 and 10 of the FAA. Petitioner 
Denise Badgerow initiated an arbitration proceeding against her em-
ployer's principals (collectively, Walters), alleging that she was unlaw-
fully terminated. After arbitrators dismissed Badgerow's claims, she 
fled suit in Louisiana state court to vacate the arbitral award. Walters 
1 
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2 BADGEROW v. WALTERS 
Syllabus 
removed the case to Federal District Court and applied to confrm the 
award. Badgerow then moved to remand the case to state court, ar-
guing that the federal court lacked jurisdiction to resolve the parties' 
requests—under Sections 10 and 9 of the FAA, respectively—to vacate 
or confrm the award. The District Court applied Vaden's look-through 
approach, fnding jurisdiction in the federal-law claims contained in 
Badgerow's underlying employment action. The District Court ac-
knowledged that Sections 9 and 10 of the FAA lack the distinctive text 
on which Vaden relied, but it applied the look-through approach anyway 
so that “consistent jurisdictional principles” would govern all kinds of 
FAA applications. The Fifth Circuit affrmed. 
Held: Vaden's “look-through” approach to determining federal jurisdiction 
does not apply to requests to confrm or vacate arbitral awards under 
Sections 9 and 10 of the FAA. Pp. 7–19. 
(a) Congress has granted federal district courts jurisdiction over two 
main kinds of cases: suits between citizens of different States as to any 
matter valued at more than $75,000 (diversity cases), 28 U. S. C. 
§ 1332(a), and suits “arising under” federal law (federal-question cases), 
§ 1331. Normally, a court has federal-question jurisdiction whenever 
federal law authorizes an action. But because this Court has held that 
the FAA's provisions do not themselves support federal jurisdiction, a 
federal court must fnd an independent basis for jurisdiction to resolve 
an arbitral dispute. In this case, neither application reveals a jurisdic-
tional basis on its face. So to fnd an independent basis for jurisdiction, 
the District Court had to look through the Section 9 and 10 applications 
to the underlying substantive dispute, where a federal-law claim satisfy-
ing § 1331 indeed exists. 
In Vaden, this Court approved the look-through approach for a Sec-
tion 4 petition by relying on that section's express language. That lan-
guage provides that a party to an arbitration agreement may petition 
for an order to compel arbitration in a “United States district court 
which, save for [the arbitration] agreement, would have jurisdiction” 
over “the controversy between the parties.” “The phrase `save for [the 
arbitration] agreement,' ” the Court stated, “indicates that the district 
court should assume the absence of the arbitration agreement and deter-
mine whether [the court] `would have jurisdiction . . .' without it” by 
looking through to the “underlying substantive controversy” between 
the parties. 556 U. S., at 62. 
Sections 9 and 10 of the FAA contain none of the statutory language 
on which Vaden relied. So under ordinary principles of statutory con-
struction, the look-through method should not apply. “[W]hen Con-

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Syllabus 
gress includes particular language in one section of a statute but omits 
it in another section of the same Act,” this Court generally takes the 
choice to be deliberate. Collins v. Yellen, 594 U. S. –––, –––. That 
holds true for jurisdictional questions, as federal “district courts may 
not exercise jurisdiction absent a statutory basis.” Exxon Mobil Corp. 
v. Allapattah Services, Inc., 545 U. S. 546, 552. Because a statutory 
basis for look-through jurisdiction is lacking in Sections 9 and 10, the 
Court cannot reach the same result here as in Vaden. Pp. 7–12. 
(b) Walters presents a two-part argument to justify exercising juris-
diction here. Walters frst claims that Section 4's language does not 
authorize look-through jurisdiction, but is only a capacious venue provi-
sion designed to give applicants a broad choice among federal courts 
possessing jurisdiction. Walters next construes Section 6—which re-
quires any FAA application to “be made and heard in the manner pro-
vided by law for the making and hearing of motions”—to provide the 
basis for an FAA-wide look-through rule. 
Walters's reading of Section 4 does not comport with how Vaden un-
derstood Section 4 or with the actual text of that provision, which never 
mentions venue, and refers only to jurisdiction. And Walters's Section 
6 argument fares no better. Courts do not possess jurisdiction to de-
cide ordinary motions by virtue of the look-through method. So Con-
gress would not have prescribed that method by telling courts, as 
Section 6 does, to treat FAA applications like motions. Pp. 12–15. 
(c) Walters also makes several policy arguments preaching the vir-
tues of adopting look-through as a uniform jurisdictional rule. Walters 
claims that a uniform rule will promote “administrative simplicity”; that 
the look-through approach will be “easier to apply” than a test ground-
ing jurisdiction on the face of the FAA application itself; and that the 
look-through rule will provide federal courts with more comprehensive 
control over the arbitration process. Brief for Respondents 27, 28. 
But “[e]ven the most formidable policy arguments cannot overcome a 
clear statutory directive.” BP p.l.c. v. Mayor and City Council of Bal-
timore, 593 U. S. –––, –––. And anyway, Walters oversells the superior-
ity of his proposal. First, uniformity in and of itself provides no real 
advantage here because courts can easily tell whether to apply look-
through or the normal jurisdictional rules. Second, the use of those 
ordinary rules, in the context of arbitration applications, is hardly be-
yond judicial capacity. And third, there are good reasons why state, 
rather than federal, courts should handle applications like the ones in 
this case. Pp. 15–19. 
975 F. 3d 469, reversed and remanded.

4 BADGEROW v. WALTERS 
Opinion of the Court 
Kagan, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which Roberts, C. J., 
and Thomas, Alito, Sotomayor, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and Barrett, 
JJ., joined. Breyer, J., fled a dissenting opinion, post, p. 19. 
Daniel L. Geyser argued the cause and fled briefs for 
petitioner. 
Lisa S. Blatt argued the cause for respondents. With her 
on the brief were Sarah M. Harris, Katherine Moran Meeks, 
Eve B. Masinter, E. Fredrick Preis, Jr., and Matthew M. 
McCluer.* 
Justice Kagan delivered the opinion of the Court. 
The Federal Arbitration Act (FAA), 9 U. S. C. § 1 et seq., 
authorizes a party to an arbitration agreement to seek sev-
eral kinds of assistance from a federal court. Under Section 
4, for example, a party may ask the court to compel an arbi-
tration proceeding, as the agreement contemplates. And 
under Sections 9 and 10, a party may apply to the court to 
confrm, or alternatively to vacate, an arbitral award. 
Yet the federal courts, as we have often held, may or may 
not have jurisdiction to decide such a request. The Act's 
authorization of a petition does not itself create jurisdiction. 
Rather, the federal court must have what we have called 
an “independent jurisdictional basis” to resolve the matter. 
Hall Street Associates, L. L. C. v. Mattel, Inc., 552 U. S. 576, 
582 (2008). 
In Vaden v. Discover Bank, 556 U. S. 49 (2009), we as-
sessed whether there was a jurisdictional basis to decide a 
Section 4 petition to compel arbitration by means of examin-
ing the parties' underlying dispute. The text of Section 4, 
*Zachary D. Tripp and Jennifer B. Dickey fled a brief for the Chamber 
of Commerce of the United States of America as amicus curiae urging 
affrmance. 
Briefs of amici curiae were fled for the Securities Industry and Finan-
cial Markets Association by Thomas G. Saunders, Peter G. Neiman, Mark 
C. Fleming, and Eric L. Hawkins; and for Imre Stephen Szalai by Mr. Sza-
lai, pro se. 
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Opinion of the Court 
we reasoned, instructs a federal court to “look through” the 
petition to the “underlying substantive controversy” be-
tween the parties—even though that controversy is not be-
fore the court. Id., at 62. If the underlying dispute falls 
within the court's jurisdiction—for example, by presenting a 
federal question—then the court may rule on the petition to 
compel. That is so regardless whether the petition alone 
could establish the court's jurisdiction. 
The question presented here is whether that same “look-
through” approach to jurisdiction applies to requests to con-
frm or vacate arbitral awards under the FAA's Sections 9 
and 10. We hold it does not. Those sections lack Section 
4's distinctive language directing a look-through, on which 
Vaden rested. Without that statutory instruction, a court 
may look only to the application actually submitted to it in 
assessing its jurisdiction. 
I 
This case grows out of the arbitration of an employment 
dispute. Petitioner Denise Badgerow worked as a fnancial 
advisor for REJ Properties, a frm run by respondents Greg 
Walters, Thomas Meyer, and Ray Trosclair. (For ease of 
reference, we refer from now on only to Walters.) Badge-
row's contract required her to bring claims arising out of her 
employment to arbitration, rather than to court. So when 
she was (in her view, improperly) fred, she initiated an arbi-
tration action against Walters, alleging unlawful termination 
under both federal and state law. The arbitrators sided 
with Walters, dismissing Badgerow's claims. 
What happened afterward—when Badgerow refused to 
give up—created the jurisdictional issue we address today. 
Believing that fraud had tainted the arbitration proceeding, 
Badgerow sued Walters in Louisiana state court to vacate 
the arbitral decision. Walters responded by removing the 
case to Federal District Court—and, once there, applying 
to confrm the arbitral award. Finally, Badgerow moved to 
remand the case to state court, arguing that the federal 
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6 BADGEROW v. WALTERS 
Opinion of the Court 
court lacked jurisdiction over the parties' requests—under 
Sections 10 and 9, respectively—to vacate or confrm the 
award. 
The District Court assessed its jurisdiction under the look 
through approach this Court adopted in Vaden v. Discover 
Bank. See 2019 WL 2611127, *1 (ED La., June 26, 2019). 
That approach, as just noted, allows a federal court to exer-
cise jurisdiction over an FAA application when the parties' 
underlying substantive dispute would have fallen within the 
court's jurisdiction. See supra, at 4–5. The District Court 
acknowledged that Vaden involved a different kind of arbi-
tration dispute: It concerned a petition to compel arbitration 
under the FAA's Section 4, rather than an application to con-
frm or vacate an arbitral award under Section 9 or 10. And 
Vaden's “reasoning was grounded on specifc text” in Section 
4 that Sections 9 and 10 “do[ ] not contain.” 2019 WL 
2611127, *2. But the court thought it should apply the look-
through approach anyway, so that “consistent jurisdictional 
principles” would govern all kinds of FAA applications. 
Ibid. And under that approach, the court had jurisdiction 
because Badgerow's underlying employment action raised 
federal-law claims. The court thus went on to resolve the 
dispute over whether fraud had infected the arbitration pro-
ceeding. Finding it had not, the court granted Walters's ap-
plication to confrm, and denied Badgerow's application to 
vacate, the arbitral award. 
The United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit 
affrmed the District Court's fnding of jurisdiction, relying 
on a just-issued Circuit precedent. See 975 F. 3d 469, 472– 
474 (2020) (citing Quezada v. Bechtel OG&C Constr. Servs., 
Inc., 946 F. 3d 837, 843 (2020)). In that decision, the Fifth 
Circuit had echoed the reasoning of the District Court here. 
Yes, the language of Section 4 directing use of the look-
through approach “is in fact absent in” the FAA's other sec-
tions. 946 F. 3d, at 842. But, the court continued, a “princi-
ple of uniformity” applying to the FAA “dictates using the 
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Opinion of the Court 
same approach for determining jurisdiction under each sec-
tion of the statute.” Ibid.; but see id., at 845–846 (Ho, J., 
dissenting) (rejecting that asserted principle in favor of “[f]i-
delity to text”). As applied to this case, that analysis meant 
that the district court had jurisdiction over Walters's Sec-
tion 9 and Badgerow's Section 10 applications. 
Courts have divided over whether the look-through ap-
proach used in Vaden can establish jurisdiction in a case like 
this one—when the application before the court seeks not to 
compel arbitration under Section 4 but to confrm, vacate, or 
modify an arbitral award under other sections of the FAA.
1 
We granted certiorari to resolve the confict, 593 U. S. ––– 
(2021), and now reverse the judgment below. 
II 
The district courts of the United States are courts of lim-
ited jurisdiction, defned (within constitutional bounds) by 
federal statute. See, e. g. , Kokkonen v. Guardian Life 
Ins. Co. of America, 511 U. S. 375, 377 (1994). Congress 
has granted those courts jurisdiction over two main kinds 
of cases. District courts have power to decide diversity 
cases—suits between citizens of different States as to any 
matter valued at more than $75,000. See 28 U. S. C. 
§ 1332(a). And they have power to decide federal-question 
cases—suits “arising under” federal law. § 1331. Typically, 
an action arises under federal law if that law “creates the 
cause of action asserted.” Gunn v. Minton, 568 U. S. 251, 
1 Compare Quezada v. Bechtel OG&C Constr. Servs., Inc., 946 F. 3d 837, 
843 (CA5 2020) (holding that the look-through approach applies to applica-
tions to confrm, vacate, or modify an arbitral award); Ortiz-Espinosa v. 
BBVA Securities of P . R., Inc., 852 F. 3d 36, 47 (CA1 2017) (same); Doscher 
v. Sea Port Group Securities, LLC , 832 F. 3d 372, 381–388 (CA2 2016) 
(same); McCormick v. America Online, Inc., 909 F. 3d 677, 680–684 (CA4 
2018) (same), with Goldman v. Citigroup Global Markets Inc., 834 F. 3d 
242, 252–255 (CA3 2016) (holding that the look-through approach does not 
apply to those applications); Magruder v. Fidelity Brokerage Servs., 818 
F. 3d 285, 287–289 (CA7 2016) (same). 
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8 BADGEROW v. WALTERS 
Opinion of the Court 
257 (2013). So when federal law authorizes the action, the 
party bringing it—once again, typically—gets to go to fed-
eral court. 
But that is not necessarily true of FAA-created arbitration 
actions. As noted above, the FAA authorizes parties to 
arbitration agreements to fle specifed actions in federal 
court—most prominently, petitions to compel arbitration 
(under Section 4) and applications to confrm, vacate, or mod-
ify arbitral awards (under Sections 9 through 11). See 
supra , at 4. But those provisions, this Court has held, 
do not themselves support federal jurisdiction. See Hall 
Street, 552 U. S., at 581–582; Vaden, 556 U. S., at 59. (Were 
it otherwise, every arbitration in the country, however dis-
tant from federal concerns, could wind up in federal district 
court.) A federal court may entertain an action brought 
under the FAA only if the action has an “independent juris-
dictional basis.” Hall Street, 552 U. S., at 582. That means 
an applicant seeking, for example, to vacate an arbitral 
award under Section 10 must identify a grant of jurisdiction, 
apart from Section 10 itself, conferring “access to a federal 
forum.” Vaden, 556 U. S., at 59. If she cannot, the action 
belongs in state court. The FAA requires those courts, too, 
to honor arbitration agreements; and we have long recog-
nized their “prominent role” in arbitral enforcement. Ibid.; 
see id., at 71; Southland Corp. v. Keating, 465 U. S. 1, 12– 
16 (1984).
2 
2 This Court has held that the FAA's core substantive requirement— 
Section 2's command to enforce arbitration agreements like other con-
tracts—applies in state courts, just as it does in federal courts. See 
Southland Corp., 465 U. S., at 12–16. We have never decided whether the 
FAA's more procedural provisions, including Sections 4 and 9 through 11, 
also apply in state courts. See Vaden, 556 U. S., at 71, n. 20; see also post, 
at 25 (Breyer, J., dissenting) (expressing concern that they do not). But 
we have made clear that Section 2 “carries with it” a duty for States to 
provide certain enforcement mechanisms equivalent to the FAA's. See 
Vaden, 556 U. S., at 71 (referring specifcally to Sections 3 and 4). And 
most, if not all, States in fact provide procedural vehicles, similar to those 
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Opinion of the Court 
The issue here is about where a federal court should look 
to determine whether an action brought under Section 9 or 
10 has an independent jurisdictional basis. An obvious 
place is the face of the application itself. If it shows that 
the contending parties are citizens of different States (with 
over $75,000 in dispute), then § 1332(a) gives the court diver-
sity jurisdiction. Or if it alleges that federal law (beyond 
Section 9 or 10 itself ) entitles the applicant to relief, then 
§ 1331 gives the court federal-question jurisdiction. But 
those possibilities do Walters no good. He and Badgerow 
are from the same State. And their applications raise no 
federal issue. Recall that the two are now contesting not 
the legality of Badgerow's fring but the enforceability of an 
arbitral award. That award is no more than a contractual 
resolution of the parties' dispute—a way of settling legal 
claims. See Vaden, 556 U. S., at 63. And quarrels about 
legal settlements—even settlements of federal claims—typi-
cally involve only state law, like disagreements about other 
contracts. See Kokkonen, 511 U. S., at 378–382. So the 
District Court here, as Walters recognizes, had to go beyond 
the face of the Section 9 and 10 applications to fnd a basis 
for jurisdiction. See Brief for Respondents 26–27. It had 
to proceed downward to Badgerow's employment action, 
where a federal-law claim satisfying § 1331 indeed exists. 
In other words, the court had to look through the Section 9 
and 10 applications to the underlying substantive dispute, 
although that dispute was not before it. Could the court 
do so? 
In Vaden, this Court approved the look-through approach 
for a Section 4 petition, relying on that section's express lan-
in the FAA, to enforce arbitration agreements—including, as here, to re-
solve post-arbitration disputes by means of confrming, modifying, or va-
cating arbitral awards. See, e. g., Revised Uniform Arbitration Act of 
2000 §§ 22–24, 7 U. L. A. 26 (2009) (adopted in 21 States and the District 
of Columbia); Cal. Civ. Proc. Code Ann. §§ 1285–1287.6 (West 2022); N. Y . 
Civ. Prac. Law Ann. §§ 7510–7511 (West 2022). 
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10 BADGEROW v. WALTERS 
Opinion of the Court 
guage. Under Section 4, a party to an arbitration agree-
ment may petition for an order to compel arbitration in a 
“United States district court which, save for [the arbitration] 
agreement, would have jurisdiction” over “the controversy 
between the parties.” 
3 That text, we stated, “drives our 
conclusion that a federal court should determine its jurisdic-
tion by `looking through' a § 4 petition to the underlying sub-
stantive controversy”—to see, for example, if that dispute 
“ `arises under' federal law.” 556 U. S., at 62. 
To show why that is so, we proceeded methodically 
through Section 4's wording. “The phrase `save for [the ar-
bitration] agreement,' ” we began, “indicates that the district 
court should assume the absence of the arbitration agree-
ment and determine whether [the court] `would have juris-
diction . . .' without it.” Ibid. (frst alteration in original). 
But “[j]urisdiction over what?” Ibid. “The text of Section 
4,” we continued, “refers us to `the controversy between 
the parties.' ” Ibid. And that “controversy,” we explained, 
could not mean the dispute before the court about “the exist-
ence or applicability of an arbitration agreement”; after all, 
the preceding save-for clause had just “direct[ed] courts” to 
assume that agreement away. Id., at 63. The “controversy 
between the parties” instead had to mean their “underlying 
substantive controversy.” Id., at 62 (internal quotation 
marks omitted). “Attending to the language” of Section 4 
thus required “approv[ing] the `look through' approach” as 
a means of assessing jurisdiction over petitions to compel 
arbitration. Ibid. The opposite view was not merely 
faulty; it was “textual[ly] implausib[le].” Id., at 65. 
3 In full, the relevant sentence of Section 4 reads: “A party aggrieved by 
the alleged failure, neglect, or refusal of another to arbitrate under a writ-
ten agreement for arbitration may petition any United States district 
court which, save for such agreement, would have jurisdiction under title 
28, in a civil action or in admiralty of the subject matter of a suit arising 
out of the controversy between the parties, for an order directing that 
such arbitration proceed in the manner provided for in such agreement.”

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Opinion of the Court 
But Sections 9 and 10, in addressing applications to con-
frm or vacate an arbitral award, contain none of the statu-
tory language on which Vaden relied. Most notably, those 
provisions do not have Section 4's “save for” clause. They 
do not instruct a court to imagine a world without an arbitra-
tion agreement, and to ask whether it would then have juris-
diction over the parties' dispute. Indeed, Sections 9 and 10 
do not mention the court's subject-matter jurisdiction at all.
4 
So under ordinary principles of statutory construction, the 
look-through method for assessing jurisdiction should not 
apply. “[W]hen Congress includes particular language in 
one section of a statute but omits it in another section of the 
same Act,” we generally take the choice to be deliberate. 
Collins v. Yellen, 594 U. S. –––, ––– (2021) (internal quotation 
marks omitted). We have no warrant to redline the FAA, 
importing Section 4's consequential language into provisions 
containing nothing like it. Congress could have replicated 
Section 4's look-through instruction in Sections 9 and 10. Or 
for that matter, it could have drafted a global look-through 
provision, applying the approach throughout the FAA. But 
Congress did neither. And its decision governs. 
Nothing in that conclusion changes because a jurisdictional 
question is before us. The federal “district courts may 
not exercise jurisdiction absent a statutory basis.” Exxon 
Mobil Corp. v. Allapattah Services, Inc., 545 U. S. 546, 552 
(2005). And the jurisdiction Congress confers may not “be 
expanded by judicial decree.” Kokkonen, 511 U. S., at 377. 
4 Section 9 provides, in relevant part, that if an arbitration agreement 
states “that a judgment of the court shall be entered upon the [arbitral] 
award,” then a “party to the arbitration may apply” within a year to the 
federal court located where the award was made (or any other court speci-
fed) “for an order confrming the award, and thereupon the court must 
grant such an order unless the award is vacated, modifed, or corrected” 
as the Act otherwise prescribes. 
Section 10 provides, in relevant part, that a United States court “may 
make an order vacating the award upon the application of any party to 
the arbitration” if the award is tainted in any of four specifed ways. 
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12 BADGEROW v. WALTERS 
Opinion of the Court 
Those bedrock principles prevent us from pulling look-
through jurisdiction out of thin air—from somehow fnding, 
without textual support, that federal courts may use the 
method to resolve various state-law-based, non-diverse Sec-
tion 9 and 10 applications. The look-through rule is a highly 
unusual one: It locates jurisdiction not in the action actually 
before the court, but in another controversy neither there 
nor ever meant to be. We recognized that rule in Vaden 
because careful analysis of Section 4's text showed that Con-
gress wanted it applied to petitions brought under that pro-
vision. See 556 U. S., at 62–65. But Congress has not so 
directed in Sections 9 and 10. Congress has not authorized 
a federal court to adjudicate a Section 9 or 10 application 
just because the contractual dispute it presents grew out of 
arbitrating different claims, turning on different law, that 
(save for the parties' agreement) could have been brought in 
federal court. And because a statutory basis for look-
through jurisdiction is lacking here, we cannot reach the 
same result as in Vaden: That would indeed be jurisdictional 
“expan[sion] by judicial decree.” Kokkonen , 511 U. S., 
at 377. 
Walters contests that view of the statute. Unlike the 
Courts of Appeals to have adopted his position, including the 
Fifth Circuit below, see supra, at 6–7, he offers a reading of 
the FAA's text to justify exercising jurisdiction here.
5 Wal-
5 By contrast, the dissenting opinion reads, from start to fnish, more 
like the decisions of the courts below: Even when that opinion fnally turns 
to the FAA's text, it emphasizes something much like the lower courts' 
uniformity principle. See post, at 27–29; supra, at 6–7. Because, the dis-
sent says, all the FAA's sections “describe connected components of a sin-
gle matter” (namely, a “court's arbitration-related enforcement power”), 
and because those provisions serve the same “general purpose[ ],” the stat-
ute “permits” a court to hold that “Section 4's jurisdictional rule should 
apply throughout.” Post, at 27–29. But the (nigh-inevitable) connection 
among a statute's diverse provisions does not give a court carte blanche 
to move rules or concepts from any one section to any or all others. For 
the reasons already stated, we cannot read this non-uniform statute— 
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Opinion of the Court 
ters's argument comes in two parts. First, Walters says, 
the language in Section 4 that Vaden construed does not in 
fact authorize the use of the look-through jurisdictional 
method. In his view, that sentence is only a capacious 
“venue provision,” serving to “expand[ ] venue to the limits 
of [federal] jurisdiction” (and thus to give an applicant a 
broad choice among federal courts possessing jurisdiction). 
Brief for Respondents 12, 23. Second, Walters claims that 
Section 6 provides the basis for an FAA-wide look-through 
jurisdictional rule. Under Section 6, any FAA application 
“shall be made and heard in the manner provided by law for 
the making and hearing of motions.” That provision, Wal-
ters claims, requires use of the look-through approach be-
cause “[f]ederal courts have jurisdiction over motions when 
they have jurisdiction over the underlying action.” Brief 
for Respondents 19 (internal quotation marks omitted). So 
to recap Walters's theory: Section 4 does not establish any 
jurisdictional rule for applications to compel in particular, 
while Section 6 establishes the look-through jurisdictional 
rule for all kinds of FAA applications. 
But Walters's understanding of Section 4 does not comport 
with what it says. The language of that provision never 
mentions “venue”; it refers only to “jurisdiction.” That is a 
signal, sharp and clear, that the section provides a jurisdic-
tional rule. And even suppose (against all odds) that Con-
gress had meant to state the venue rule Walters proposes 
without ever using the word “venue.” In that event, Con-
gress could have simply permitted fling the petition in any 
district court with jurisdiction (or even more simply—be-
cause a court can never act without jurisdiction—in any dis-
trict court). Given that (in Walters's view) the jurisdic-
tional rule comes from another provision, Congress would 
not have needed to (again) spell out its content. But spell-
setting out a jurisdictional rule in one section but conspicuously omitting 
it in all others—as though it applied a single rule throughout. See supra, 
at 11–12. 
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14 BADGEROW v. WALTERS 
Opinion of the Court 
ing out the rule's content—by describing the look-through 
method—is exactly what Section 4 does. That description 
can serve one purpose only: to establish jurisdiction where 
it would otherwise not exist. 
And that is how Vaden understood Section 4. Our deci-
sion, like the relevant text, never once referred to venue. 
Instead, we spoke, throughout the opinion, of the way Sec-
tion 4 provides for jurisdiction. We formulated the question 
presented as whether the district court could “exercise juris-
diction over [the party's] § 4 petition.” 556 U. S., at 53; see 
id., at 57 (stating that “[w]e granted certiorari” to decide 
whether district courts could use the look-through method 
“to determine whether federal-question jurisdiction exists 
over [a] § 4 petition”). And we framed our holding as about 
jurisdiction: “[A] federal court should determine its jurisdic-
tion by `looking through' a § 4 petition.” Id., at 62; see id., 
at 72 (Roberts, C. J., dissenting) (differing about the rule's 
application, but agreeing that a court presented with a Sec-
tion 4 petition should use the look-through method “in deter-
mining whether it has jurisdiction”). In short, Section 4's 
“save for” text “dr[ove] our conclusion” not about venue, but 
about “jurisdiction.” Id., at 62. And so that text, as shown 
above, contradicts Walters's position—for it appears in Sec-
tion 4 alone, rather than also in Sections 9 and 10. See 
supra, at 11–12. 
Walters's theory fares no better in construing Section 6's 
mention of motions to prescribe a look-through rule for the 
whole FAA. Here, Walters commits the opposite of his fault 
in reading Section 4: He now reads a provision containing no 
express reference to jurisdiction in fact to set out a jurisdic-
tional rule. There may be rare contexts in which courts can, 
without such a reference, “infer that Congress has expanded 
our jurisdiction”—but this is not one. Welch v. Texas Dept. 
of Highways and Public Transp., 483 U. S. 468, 474 (1987) 
(plurality opinion). The look-through method, as noted be-
fore, is a jurisdictional outlier. See supra, at 12. For Con-

Cite as: 596 U. S. 1 (2022) 15 
Opinion of the Court 
gress to prescribe it by telling courts, a la Section 6, to treat 
FAA applications like motions in other kinds of litigation 
would be not just oblique but simply bizarre. Courts, after 
all, do not possess jurisdiction to decide ordinary motions by 
virtue of the look-through method. A motion (unlike a typi-
cal FAA application) is part of a case actually in court. Ju-
risdiction to decide the case includes jurisdiction to decide 
the motion; there is no need to “look through” the motion in 
search of a jurisdictional basis outside the court. And if the 
look-through rule does not apply to motions, then Section 6's 
reference to motions cannot direct the look-through rule. 
We have formerly described that provision's function as 
something different: Section 6, we said, ensures that FAA 
applications “get streamlined treatment”—a kind of “expe-
dited review,” as compared to what a party would receive if 
she brought a normal contract suit. Hall Street, 552 U. S., 
at 582, and n. 3. However hard we squint, we cannot also 
discern in Section 6 an FAA-wide look-through rule; the only 
such rule in the FAA, applying only to petitions to compel, 
resides in Section 4. 
Walters's more thought-provoking arguments sound not in 
text but in policy. Here, Walters—now joined by the dis-
sent—preaches the virtues of adopting look-through as a 
“single, easy-to-apply jurisdictional test” that will produce 
“sensible” results. Brief for Respondents 28 (internal quo-
tation marks omitted); see post, at 22–27 (opinion of Breyer, 
J.) (lauding the “advantages” of look-through's “practical con-
sequences”). First, Walters says, a uniform jurisdictional 
rule, applying to all FAA applications alike, will necessarily 
promote “administrative simplicity” because a court will not 
have to fgure out which rule to apply. Brief for Respond-
ents 27. Second, he claims, the look-through rule is “easier 
to apply” than a test that would ground jurisdiction on the 
face of the FAA application itself. Id., at 28 (internal quota-
tion marks omitted). In particular, he says, the latter ap-
proach confronts courts with “hard questions” about how to 
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16 BADGEROW v. WALTERS 
Opinion of the Court 
determine diversity jurisdiction (including its amount-in-
controversy component) across a range of settings—for the 
Section 9 and 10 applications at issue here, as well as for 
Section 5 and 7 petitions (obviously not at issue) to appoint 
arbitrators or compel the presence of witnesses. Id., at 41. 
(The dissent's vaunted practical “advantages” also mostly con-
cern avoiding those diversity issues. Post, at 22; see post, 
at 22–25.) 
6 Finally, Walters contends that only the look-
through rule will provide federal courts with comprehensive 
control over the arbitration process, including the period 
after the award. The opposite position, he says, will “close 
the federal courthouse doors to many” post-arbitration mo-
tions, even when they grow out of disputes raising “exclu-
sively federal claims.” Brief for Respondents 37, 46. 
Walters himself quotes back to us the topline answer to 
those theories, refecting its obviousness: “Even the most for-
midable policy arguments cannot overcome a clear statutory 
directive.” Id., at 44 (quoting BP p.l.c. v. Mayor and City 
Council of Baltimore , 593 U. S. –––, ––– (2021); alteration 
omitted). Walters's (and the dissent's) what-makes-best-
sense assertions rest on the view that “the FAA contains 
no” such clear “directive” limiting look-through jurisdiction 
to Section 4. Brief for Respondents 44–45; see post, at 28. 
Having rejected that view, we cannot fnd much relevance in 
his ideas, even if plausible, about the optimal jurisdictional 
rule for the FAA. “It is not for this Court to employ unteth-
ered notions of what might be good public policy to expand 
our jurisdiction.” Whitmore v. Arkansas, 495 U. S. 149, 161 
(1990). However the pros and cons shake out, Congress has 
6 The dissent's lead item in this vein concerns a Section 5 petition to 
appoint an arbitrator that is made “in tandem with” a Section 4 petition 
over which a federal court has jurisdiction. Post, at 23. Because Section 
5 is not at issue here, we do not express any view about whether the 
relationship that the dissent hypothesizes would give the court jurisdic-
tion over the appointment request. 
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Opinion of the Court 
made its call. We will not impose uniformity on the stat-
ute's non-uniform jurisdictional rules. 
And anyway, we think Walters oversells the superiority of 
his proposal. First, uniformity in and of itself provides no 
real advantage in this sphere. A court can tell in an instant 
whether an application arises under Section 4 or, as here, 
under Section 9 or 10; so it can also tell in an instant whether 
to apply the look-through method or the usual jurisdictional 
rules. Second, the use of those ordinary rules—most nota-
bly, relating to diversity jurisdiction—is hardly beyond judi-
cial capacity. Federal courts have faced, and federal courts 
have resolved, diversity questions for over two centuries, in 
diverse and ever-changing legal contexts. Throughout, they 
have developed workable rules; and we see no reason to 
think they will do differently here. Indeed, past practice 
belies Walters's and the dissent's gloomy predictions. Al-
though they spin out hypotheticals designed to make the 
project look ultra-confusing, they fail to identify any actual 
problems that have arisen from courts' longstanding applica-
tion of diversity standards to FAA applications (without 
using look-through). And Walters's solution does not even 
avoid the (purported) diffculty of which he complains. For 
he does not claim (nor could he) that look-through is the ex-
clusive means of establishing federal jurisdiction. Even if 
the underlying action does not fall within a district court's 
jurisdiction, the application still might do so—say, because 
the parties have changed, and are now diverse. See supra, 
at 9. So courts, on Walters's own view, will still have to 
resolve questions about—and develop rules for—determin-
ing diversity in the FAA context. The difference is only 
one of degree—and too small, under any plausible theory of 
statutory interpretation, to adopt Walters's proposal to re-
write the law. 
Finally, we can see why Congress chose to place fewer 
arbitration disputes in federal court than Walters wishes. 
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18 BADGEROW v. WALTERS 
Opinion of the Court 
The statutory plan, as suggested above, makes Section 9 and 
10 applications conform to the normal—and sensible—judi-
cial division of labor: The applications go to state, rather than 
federal, courts when they raise claims between non-diverse 
parties involving state law. See supra, at 8–9. As Walters 
notes, those claims may have originated in the arbitration of 
a federal-law dispute. But the underlying dispute is not 
now at issue. Rather, the application concerns the contrac-
tual rights provided in the arbitration agreement, generally 
governed by state law. And adjudication of such state-law 
contractual rights—as this Court has held in addressing a 
non-arbitration settlement of federal claims—typically be-
longs in state courts. See Kokkonen, 511 U. S., at 381–382; 
supra, at 9. To be sure, Congress created an exception to 
those ordinary jurisdictional principles for Section 4 peti-
tions to compel. But it is one thing to make an exception, 
quite another to extend that exception everywhere. See 
post, at 26 (disregarding this point). As this Court has often 
said, the “preeminent” purpose of the FAA was to overcome 
some judges' reluctance to enforce arbitration agreements 
when a party tried to sue in court instead. E. g., Dean Wit-
ter Reynolds Inc. v. Byrd, 470 U. S. 213, 221 (1985). We 
have never detected a similar congressional worry about 
judges' willingness to enforce arbitration awards already 
made. So Congress might well have thought an expansion 
of federal jurisdiction appropriate for petitions to compel 
alone. Applications about arbitral decisions could and 
should follow the normal rules. 
The result, as Walters laments, is to give state courts a 
signifcant role in implementing the FAA. But we have long 
recognized that feature of the statute. “[E]nforcement of 
the Act,” we have understood, “is left in large part to the 
state courts.” Moses H. Cone Memorial Hospital v. Mer-
cury Constr. Corp., 460 U. S. 1, 25, n. 32 (1983); see Vaden, 
556 U. S., at 59; Hall Street, 552 U. S., at 582. As relevant 
here, Congress chose to respect the capacity of state courts 
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Breyer, J., dissenting 
to properly enforce arbitral awards. In our turn, we must 
respect that evident congressional choice. 
* * * 
For the reasons stated, we reverse the judgment of the 
Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit and remand the case 
for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. 
It is so ordered. 
Justice Breyer, dissenting. 
When interpreting a statute, it is often helpful to consider 
not simply the statute's literal words, but also the statute's 
purposes and the likely consequences of our interpretation. 
Otherwise, we risk adopting an interpretation that, even if 
consistent with text, creates unnecessary complexity and 
confusion. That, I fear, is what the majority's interpretation 
here will do. I consequently dissent. 
I 
The question presented arises in the context of the Fed-
eral Arbitration Act (FAA). 9 U. S. C. § 1 et seq. The ques-
tion is technical and jurisdictional: How does a federal court 
determine whether it has jurisdiction to consider a motion to 
confrm or vacate an arbitration award? The FAA contains 
several sections that seem to empower a federal court to 
take certain specifed actions related to arbitration proceed-
ings. These include Section 4, which gives “any United 
States district court” the power to “order” parties to a writ-
ten arbitration agreement to “proceed” to arbitration; Sec-
tion 5, which gives “the court” the power to “designate and 
appoint an arbitrator”; Section 7, which gives “the United 
States district court for the district” in which an arbitrator 
is sitting the power to “compel the attendance” of witnesses 
whom the arbitrator has “summoned”; Section 9, which gives 
“the United States court in and for the district within which” 
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20 BADGEROW v. WALTERS 
Breyer, J., dissenting 
an arbitration award “was made” the power to enter an 
“order confrming the award”; Section 10, which gives “the 
United States court in and for the district wherein the [arbi-
tration] award was made” the power to “make an order va-
cating the award”; and Section 11, which gives “the United 
States court in and for the district wherein the [arbitration] 
award was made” the power to “modif[y] or correc[t] the 
award.” 9 U. S. C. §§ 4, 5, 7, 9, 10, 11. (Here, as throughout, 
I have simplifed the descriptions of the FAA's sections; the 
Appendix, infra, contains the full relevant statutory lan-
guage.) This case directly concerns jurisdiction under Sec-
tions 9 and 10, but the Court's reasoning applies to all the 
sections just mentioned. 
At frst blush, one might wonder why there is any question 
about whether a federal court has jurisdiction to consider 
requests that it act pursuant to these sections. The sec-
tions' language seems explicitly to give federal courts the 
power to take such actions. Why does that language itself 
not also grant jurisdiction to act? The answer, as the Court 
notes, is that we have held that the FAA's “authorization of 
a petition does not itself create jurisdiction.” Ante, at 4. 
“Rather, the federal court must have what we have called 
an `independent jurisdictional basis' to resolve the matter.” 
Ibid. (quoting Hall Street Associates, L. L. C. v. Mattel, Inc., 
552 U. S. 576, 582 (2008)). 
We made clear how this works in Vaden v. Discover Bank, 
556 U. S. 49 (2009), a case involving Section 4. As just 
noted, Section 4 gives a district court the power to order 
parties (who have entered into a written arbitration agree-
ment) to submit to arbitration. We held “that a federal 
court should determine its jurisdiction by `looking through' 
a § 4 petition to the parties' underlying substantive contro-
versy.” Id., at 62. The court asks whether it would have 
jurisdiction over that controversy, namely, whether that un-
derlying substantive controversy involves a federal question 
or diversity (a dispute between parties from different States

Cite as: 596 U. S. 1 (2022) 21 
Breyer, J., dissenting 
with a value of more than $75,000). See 28 U. S. C. §§ 1331, 
1332. If so, then the federal court has jurisdiction over a 
Section 4 petition asking the court to order the parties to 
resolve that controversy in arbitration. 
The Vaden Court gave two reasons for adopting this “look-
through” approach. The frst, as the majority today empha-
sizes, was textual. See 556 U. S., at 62. Section 4 says that 
a party seeking arbitration may petition for an order compel-
ling arbitration from 
“any United States district court which, save for [the 
arbitration] agreement, would have jurisdiction . . . in a 
civil action . . . of the subject matter of a suit arising out 
of the controversy between the parties.” (Emphasis 
added.) 
The words “save for [the arbitration] agreement,” we rea-
soned, tell a court not to fnd jurisdiction by looking to the 
petition to enforce the agreement itself, but instead to the 
underlying controversy between the parties. See id., at 
62–63. 
The second reason, which the majority today neglects, was 
practical. Id., at 65. To fnd jurisdiction only where the 
petition to enforce an arbitration agreement itself estab-
lished federal jurisdiction, we explained, would result in “cu-
rious practical consequences,” including unduly limiting the 
scope of Section 4 and hinging jurisdiction upon distinctions 
that were “ `totally artifcial.' ” Ibid. (quoting 1 I. MacNeil, 
R. Speidel, & T. Stipanowich, Federal Arbitration Law 
§ 9.2.3.3, p. 9:21 (1995) (hereinafter MacNeil)). 
Today, the majority holds that this look-through approach 
does not apply to Section 9 or 10 because those sections lack 
Section 4's “save for” language. Ante, at 5. This reasoning 
necessarily extends to Sections 5, 7, and 11 as well, for those 
sections, too, lack Sections 4's “save for” language. Ibid. 
(“Without [Section 4's] statutory instruction, a court may 
look only to the application actually submitted to it in assess-
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22 BADGEROW v. WALTERS 
Breyer, J., dissenting 
ing its jurisdiction”). Although this result may be consist-
ent with the statute's text, it creates what Vaden feared— 
curious consequences and artifcial distinctions. See 556 
U. S., at 65. It also creates what I fear will be consequences 
that are overly complex and impractical. 
II 
I would use the look-through approach to determine juris-
diction under each of the FAA's related provisions—Sections 
4, 5, 7, 9, 10, and 11. Doing so would avoid the same kinds 
of “curious practical consequences” that drove the Vaden 
Court to adopt the look-through approach in the frst place. 
Ibid.; see also Cortez Byrd Chips, Inc. v. Bill Harbert Constr. 
Co., 529 U. S. 193, 202 (2000) (rejecting interpretation of the 
FAA that “would create anomalous results”). Most notably, 
this approach would provide a harmonious and compara-
tively simple jurisdiction-determining rule—advantages that 
the majority's jurisdictional scheme seems to lack. Cf. 
Hertz Corp. v. Friend, 559 U. S. 77, 94 (2010) (rejecting 
“[c]omplex jurisdictional tests” in favor of “straightforward” 
and “[s]imple jurisdictional rules”). 
Consider some of the likely consequences of the majority's 
reading, which applies the look-through approach only to 
Section 4 (where the “save for” language appears), but not 
to the FAA's other sections (where it does not appear). 
First, consider Section 5. That section says that, upon 
application of one of the parties to an arbitration agreement, 
“the court shall designate and appoint an arbitrator.” 9 
U. S. C. § 5 (emphasis added). What happens when the look-
through approach shows that the underlying controversy 
raises a federal question, but the application to appoint an 
arbitrator raises no federal question and does not establish 
diversity? A party could ask a federal judge to order arbi-
tration under Section 4, but they could not then ask that 
same (or any other) federal judge to appoint an arbitrator 
for that very same arbitration under Section 5. That does 
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Cite as: 596 U. S. 1 (2022) 23 
Breyer, J., dissenting 
not seem to be what Congress had in mind for these neigh-
boring provisions—provisions that appear to assume that a 
judge can appoint an arbitrator in tandem with ordering par-
ties to arbitration. Moreover, how is a federal court to de-
termine, for diversity jurisdiction purposes, the amount at 
stake in a motion to appoint an arbitrator without a look-
through approach? Surely not by assessing the value of the 
arbitrator's request for pay. 
Second, consider Section 7. It says that “upon petition 
the United States district court for the district in which” an 
arbitrator is sitting “may compel the attendance” of persons 
whom the arbitrator has “summoned.” § 7. Suppose that 
the underlying substantive controversy does not qualify for 
federal jurisdiction, meaning that a federal court would not 
have jurisdiction to order arbitration under Section 4. If 
arbitration proceeds by other means, can a federal judge 
nonetheless compel the attendance of a witness at that arbi-
tration, based on diversity jurisdiction, if a request to do so 
shows that the summoned witness lives out of State? If 
there are two witnesses, one in State and one out of State, 
can the federal judge compel the attendance of the second, 
but not the frst? Why would Congress have wanted parties 
to toggle between federal and state court when seeking judi-
cial enforcement of summons issued during a single 
arbitration? 
And at a more basic level, who are the relevant parties to a 
Section 7 request when determining, for diversity purposes, 
whether the Section 7 dispute is between citizens of different 
States? The arbitrator and summoned witness? The par-
ties in arbitration? Only the “summoning” party and the 
witness? Compare Washington National Insurance Co. v. 
OBEX Group LLC, 958 F. 3d 126, 134 (CA2 2020) (evaluating 
diversity based on summoning party and witness), with 
Amgen, Inc. v. Kidney Center of Del. Cty. Ltd., 95 F. 3d 562, 
567–568 (CA7 1996) (evaluating diversity based on parties in 
arbitration). And assume that a federal court fnds it does 
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24 BADGEROW v. WALTERS 
Breyer, J., dissenting 
have jurisdiction over a Section 7 request, even though the 
underlying controversy involves neither a federal question 
nor diversity. “Why would Congress have wanted federal 
courts to intervene to enforce a subpoena issued in an arbi-
tration proceeding involving a controversy that itself is not 
important enough, from a federalism standpoint, to warrant 
federal-court oversight?” Maine Community Health Op-
tions v. Albertsons Cos., 993 F. 3d 720, 726 (CA9 2021) (Wat-
ford, J., concurring). 
Moreover, diversity jurisdiction requires not only that the 
relevant parties be from different States but also that the 
amount in controversy exceed $75,000. See 28 U. S. C. 
§ 1332(a). How does a federal judge determine whether 
summoning a witness is itself worth $75,000? By examining 
the value of what the witness might say? By accounting for 
travel expenses? See Maine Community Health, 993 F. 3d, 
at 723–724. As courts have recognized, there is “very little 
case law to guide [them] in determining whether enforce-
ment of an arbitration subpoena against a third party will 
enable someone to recover more than $75,000 in an arbitra-
tion dispute with a different party.” Id., at 726 (Watford, J., 
concurring). These and other jurisdiction-related questions 
do not arise if a federal judge can simply follow Vaden's prin-
ciple for all FAA motions: Look through the motions and 
determine whether there is federal jurisdiction over the un-
derlying substantive controversy. See 556 U. S., at 62–63. 
Third, consider now Sections 9 and 10, the FAA sections 
directly before us, along with Section 11. Section 9 gives 
“the United States court in and for the district within which 
[an arbitration] award was made” the power to issue “an 
order confrming the award.” Section 10 gives the same 
court the power to “vacat[e]” the award for certain specifed 
reasons. And Section 11 gives that court the power to 
“modif[y] or correc[t] the award.” Where the parties' un-
derlying dispute involves a federal question (but the parties 
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Cite as: 596 U. S. 1 (2022) 25 
Breyer, J., dissenting 
are not diverse), the majority holds that a party can ask a 
federal court to order arbitration under Section 4, but it can-
not ask that same court to confrm, vacate, or modify the 
order resulting from that arbitration under Section 9, 10, or 
11. But why prohibit a federal court from considering the 
results of the very arbitration it has ordered and is likely 
familiar with? Why force the parties to obtain relief—con-
cerning arbitration of an underlying federal-question dis-
pute—from a state court unfamiliar with the matter? 
Or suppose that a party asks a federal court to vacate an 
arbitration award under Section 10 because the arbitrator 
“refus[ed] to hear evidence pertinent and material to the con-
troversy.” § 10(a)(3). To determine at least one important 
aspect of diversity jurisdiction—the amount in contro -
versy—must the court not look to the underlying dispute? 
The same question arises with respect to a Section 11 motion 
to modify an arbitral award on the ground that it “is imper-
fect in matter of form not affecting the merits of the contro-
versy.” § 11(c). 
The majority says that these and other problems require 
only that the parties bring their FAA requests to state 
courts. Ante, at 17–18. But we cannot be sure that state 
courts have the same powers under the FAA that federal 
courts have. The FAA says nothing about state courts; it 
only explicitly mentions federal courts. See § 7 (“United 
States district court”); § 9 (“the United States court”); § 10 
(same); § 11 (same). We have never held that the FAA provi-
sions I have discussed apply in state courts, and at least one 
Member of this Court has concluded that they do not apply 
there. See, e. g., DIRECTV, Inc. v. Imburgia, 577 U. S. 
47, 59 (2015) (Thomas, J ., dissenting). State courts have 
reached similar conclusions. See, e. g., Cable Connection, 
Inc. v. DIRECTV, Inc., 44 Cal. 4th 1334, 1351, 190 P. 3d 586, 
597 (2008) (holding that §§ 4, 10, and 11 apply only in federal 
court); In re Beck's Superior Hybrids, Inc., 940 N. E. 2d 
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26 BADGEROW v. WALTERS 
Breyer, J., dissenting 
352, 362–363 (Ind. App. 2011) (same for § 7); Henderson v. 
Summerville Ford-Mercury Inc., 405 S. C. 440, 450, 748 S. E. 
2d 221, 226 (2013) (same for § 9). 
Relatedly, the majority also notes, correctly, that Section 
9, 10, and 11 disputes about the enforceability of arbitral 
awards “typically involve only state law.” Ante, at 9. It 
thus makes sense, the majority says, that these disputes 
would belong primarily in state court. See ante, at 18. But 
the same can be said for Section 4 disputes about the enforce-
ability of arbitration agreements. These, too, typically in-
volve only questions of state law. That the dispute does not 
implicate federal questions thus does not explain why Con-
gress would have wanted more federal court involvement at 
the Section 4 stage than during the later stages. 
It may be possible to eliminate some of these problems 
by using a federal-question lawsuit or Section 4 motion as a 
jurisdictional anchor. If a party to an arbitration agreement 
fles a lawsuit in federal court but then is ordered to resolve 
the claims in arbitration, the federal court may stay the suit 
and possibly retain jurisdiction over related FAA motions. 
See § 3; Vaden, 556 U. S., at 65. Similarly, some courts have 
held that if a federal court adjudicates a Section 4 motion 
to order arbitration, the court retains jurisdiction over any 
subsequent, related FAA motions. See Maine Community 
Health, 993 F. 3d, at 725 (Watford, J., concurring); see also 
McCormick v. America Online , Inc., 909 F. 3d 677, 684 (CA4 
2018). But, as Vaden points out, to turn jurisdiction over 
these later motions on the presence or absence of a federal 
lawsuit or Section 4 motion is to turn jurisdiction on a “ `to-
tally artifcial distinction' ”—particularly when the very pur-
pose of arbitration is to avoid litigation. 556 U. S., at 65 
(quoting 1 MacNeil § 9.2.3.3, at 9:21). 
I relate these practical diffculties in part to illustrate a 
more fundamental point. The majority has tried to split 
what is, or should be, a single jurisdictional atom—a single 
statute with connected parts, which parts give federal

Cite as: 596 U. S. 1 (2022) 27 
Breyer, J., dissenting 
judges the power to facilitate a single arbitration proceeding 
from start to fnish: to order arbitration; appoint an arbitra-
tor; summon witnesses; and confrm, vacate, or modify an 
arbitration award. The need for simplicity, comprehension, 
workability, and fairness all suggest that these interrelated 
provisions should follow the same basic jurisdictional ap-
proach, namely, as Vaden explains, the look-through 
approach. 
III 
The majority's interpretation is also at odds with what this 
Court has said about the purposes underlying the FAA. We 
have recognized that the statute refects a clear “ `policy of 
rapid and unobstructed enforcement of arbitration agree-
ments.' ” Cortez Byrd Chips, 529 U. S., at 201 (quoting 
Moses H. Cone Memorial Hospital v. Mercury Constr. Corp., 
460 U. S. 1, 23 (1983)); see also id., at 22 (“Congress' clear 
intent, in the Arbitration Act, [was] to move the parties to 
an arbitrable dispute out of court and into arbitration as 
quickly and easily as possible”). 
We have thus interpreted the FAA to avoid “unnecessarily 
complicating the law and breeding litigation from a statute 
that seeks to avoid it.” Allied-Bruce Terminix Cos. v. Dob-
son, 513 U. S. 265, 275 (1995). “Why,” we asked, “would 
Congress intend a test that risks the very kind of costs and 
delay through litigation . . . that Congress wrote the Act to 
help the parties avoid?” Id., at 278. In other words, the 
FAA is a “sphere” in which “uniformity in and of itself pro-
vides [a] real advantage.” Ante, at 17. 
IV 
The majority's main point is straightforward: The text of 
the statute compels the result. As the majority rightly 
points out, we cannot disregard the statutory text or “ `over-
come a clear statutory directive.' ” Ante, at 16 (quoting 
Brief for Respondents 44). A statute that says it applies 
only to “fsh” does not apply to turnips. The majority also 
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28 BADGEROW v. WALTERS 
Breyer, J., dissenting 
rightly points out that the “save for” language setting forth 
the look-through approach appears only in Section 4, and 
does not appear in any of the later sections. 
That fact, however, does not produce the “clear statutory 
directive” upon which the majority relies. Nothing in the 
text prohibits us from applying Section 4's look-through ap-
proach to the succeeding sections. The statute does not say 
that Section 4's jurisdictional rule applies only to Section 
4, or that the same look-through approach does not apply 
elsewhere. Nor does any other section provide its own ju-
risdictional rule that would suggest Section 4's rule should 
not apply there. 
Moreover, when we consider Section 4's text setting forth 
the look-through approach, we “consider not only the bare 
meaning of the word[s] but also [their] placement and pur-
pose in the statutory scheme.” Bailey v. United States, 516 
U. S. 137, 145 (1995), superseded by statute on other grounds 
as stated in Welch v. United States, 578 U. S. 120, 133 (2016). 
Various aspects of the FAA's text and structure suggest that 
Section 4's jurisdictional rule should apply throughout. Sec-
tion 5, for example, which grants the power to appoint an 
arbitrator, simply refers to “the court.” Those words, most 
naturally read, refer to the same court to which the immedi-
ately preceding section—Section 4—refers: a “United States 
district court” with jurisdiction as determined by the look-
through approach. Requests under the FAA's various sec-
tions are also generally described in the text as “applica-
tions” or “motions.” See § 4 (“application”); § 5 (same); § 9 
(same); § 10 (same); § 11 (same); see also § 6; § 12 (“motion 
to vacate, modify, or correct”); § 13 (“application to confrm, 
modify, or correct”). This implies that the requests are all 
constituent parts of one broader enforcement proceeding, not 
standalone disputes meriting individual jurisdictional inquir-
ies. See, e. g., In re Wild, 994 F. 3d 1244, 1257 (CA11 2021) 
(en banc) (“the term `motion' has never been commonly un-
derstood to denote a vehicle for initiating a new and free-

Cite as: 596 U. S. 1 (2022) 29 
Breyer, J., dissenting 
standing lawsuit”); A Modern Dictionary of the English Lan-
guage 446 (1911) (“motion in court” means “an application to 
a court . . . to have a rule or order made which is necessary 
to the progress of the action”). 
And, more importantly, all the sections describe connected 
components of a single matter: a federal court's arbitration-
related enforcement power. One can read these sections as 
a single whole, with each section providing one enforcement 
tool, and one section—Section 4—providing both an enforce-
ment tool and a jurisdictional rule applicable to the entire 
toolbox. Read this way, the FAA provides one set of com-
plementary mechanisms through which a federal court might 
facilitate a single arbitration—but only when the underlying 
substantive controversy is one that, jurisdictionally speak-
ing, could be brought in a federal court had the parties not 
agreed to arbitrate. There is no language in any of the sec-
tions that states, or suggests, that we cannot interpret the 
Act in this way. 
In brief, the text does not prevent us from reading the 
statute in a way that better refects the statute's structure 
and better fulflls the statute's basic purposes. See Allied 
Bruce, 513 U. S., at 279 (adopting interpretation of FAA that 
“the statute's language permits” and that is more consistent 
with “[t]he Act's history”); Pierce v. Underwood, 487 U. S. 
552, 563 (1988) (adopting outcome “that the text of the stat-
ute permits, and sound judicial administration counsels”). 
V 
The FAA's legislative history reinforces the view of the 
statute that I have just described. The Senate Report on 
the bill that became the FAA refers to the FAA's general 
purposes. It makes clear Congress' hope to avoid proce-
dural complexity. It refers to parties' “desire to avoid the 
delay and expense of litigation.” S. Rep. No. 536, 68th 
Cong., 1st Sess., 3 (1924). Proponents of the bill thought it 
would successfully serve that purpose because it would pro-
Page Proof Pending Publication

30 BADGEROW v. WALTERS 
Breyer, J., dissenting 
vide “very simple machinery”; “simplify legal matters”; offer 
“speedy” and “plain justice”; and allow “no opportunity for 
technical procedure.” Joint Hearings on S. 1005 et al. before 
the Subcommittees of the Committees on the Judiciary, 68th 
Cong., 1st Sess., 16, 26, 27, 36 (1924) (hereinafter Joint Hear-
ings). These general purposes support a simplifed jurisdic-
tional rule. 
The language of the House Report suggests more. It sug-
gests that the bill created a single jurisdictional procedure, 
not a set of different procedures with distinct jurisdictional 
rules. The Report says that the bill “provides a procedure 
in the Federal courts for” enforcement of arbitration agree-
ments. H. R. Rep. No. 96, 68th Cong., 1st Sess., 2 (1924) 
(emphasis added). “The procedure ,” the Report continues, 
“is very simple, . . . reducing technicality, delay, and ex-
pense . . . .” Ibid. (emphasis added). That singular proce-
dure, the Report explains, encompasses not only the initial 
request for a federal court to order arbitration under Section 
4, but subsequent requests to vacate or modify an arbitration 
award under Sections 10 and 11 as well. See ibid. 
The principal drafter of the bill made the same point yet 
more explicitly. He testifed that under the FAA, “Federal 
courts are given jurisdiction to enforce [arbitration] agree-
ments whenever . . . they would normally have jurisdiction 
of a controversy between the parties.” Joint Hearings 34 
(statement of Julius H. Cohen) (emphasis added). Immedi-
ately following, he said that “such enforcement” includes the 
power to appoint arbitrators under Section 5, which, of 
course, lacks Section 4's “save for” language. Ibid. And he 
then proceeded to discuss the FAA's other sections, all with-
out suggesting that their jurisdictional requirements were 
any different. Ibid.; see also id., at 35–36. 
Together, this history reinforces the interpretation of the 
statute that I would adopt. It suggests that Congress in-
tended a single approach for determining jurisdiction of the 
Page Proof Pending Publication

Cite as: 596 U. S. 1 (2022) 31 
Appendix to opinion of Breyer, J. 
FAA's interrelated enforcement mechanisms, not one ap-
proach for the mechanism provided in Section 4 and a dif-
ferent approach for the mechanisms provided in all other 
sections. 
* * * 
In this dissent I hope to have provided an example of what 
it means to say that we do not interpret a statute's words 
“in a vacuum.” Abramski v. United States, 573 U. S. 169, 
179 (2014). Rather, we should interpret those words “with 
reference to the statutory context, structure, history and 
purpose[,] . . . not to mention common sense.” Ibid. (inter-
nal quotation marks omitted). Here, these considerations 
all favor a uniform look-through approach. And the stat-
ute's language permits that approach. Interpretation of a 
statute must, of course, be consistent with its text. But 
looking solely to the text, and with a single-minded focus 
on individual words in the text, will sometimes lead to an 
interpretation at odds with the statute as a whole. And I 
fear that is what has happened in this case. 
I suggest that by considering not only the text, but con-
text, structure, history, purpose, and common sense, we 
would read the statute here in a different way. That way 
would connect the statute more directly with the area of law, 
and of human life, that it concerns. And it would allow the 
statute, and the law, to work better and more simply for 
those whom it is meant to serve. With respect, I dissent. 
APPENDIX 
9 U. S. C. §§ 4, 5, 7, 9, 10, 11 
Ҥ 4. Failure to arbitrate under agreement; petition to United 
States court having jurisdiction for order to compel arbitra-
tion; notice and service thereof; hearing and determination. 
“A party aggrieved by the alleged failure, neglect, or re-
fusal of another to arbitrate under a written agreement for 
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32 BADGEROW v. WALTERS 
Appendix to opinion of Breyer, J. 
arbitration may petition any United States district court 
which, save for such agreement, would have jurisdiction 
under title 28, in a civil action or in admiralty of the subject 
matter of a suit arising out of the controversy between the 
parties, for an order directing that such arbitration proceed 
in the manner provided for in such agreement. Five days' 
notice in writing of such application shall be served upon the 
party in default. Service thereof shall be made in the man-
ner provided by the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. The 
court shall hear the parties, and upon being satisfed that 
the making of the agreement for arbitration or the failure to 
comply therewith is not in issue, the court shall make an 
order directing the parties to proceed to arbitration in ac-
cordance with the terms of the agreement. The hearing and 
proceedings, under such agreement, shall be within the dis-
trict in which the petition for an order directing such arbitra-
tion is fled. If the making of the arbitration agreement or 
the failure, neglect, or refusal to perform the same be in 
issue, the court shall proceed summarily to the trial thereof. 
If no jury trial be demanded by the party alleged to be in 
default, or if the matter in dispute is within admiralty juris-
diction, the court shall hear and determine such issue. 
Where such an issue is raised, the party alleged to be in 
default may, except in cases of admiralty, on or before the 
return day of the notice of application, demand a jury trial 
of such issue, and upon such demand the court shall make an 
order referring the issue or issues to a jury in the manner 
provided by the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, or may 
specially call a jury for that purpose. If the jury fnd that 
no agreement in writing for arbitration was made or that 
there is no default in proceeding thereunder, the proceeding 
shall be dismissed. If the jury fnd that an agreement for 
arbitration was made in writing and that there is a default 
in proceeding thereunder, the court shall make an order sum-
marily directing the parties to proceed with the arbitration 
in accordance with the terms thereof.” 
Page Proof Pending Publication

Cite as: 596 U. S. 1 (2022) 33 
Appendix to opinion of Breyer, J. 
Ҥ 5. Appointment of arbitrators or umpire 
“If in the agreement provision be made for a method of 
naming or appointing an arbitrator or arbitrators or an um-
pire, such method shall be followed; but if no method be pro-
vided therein, or if a method be provided and any party 
thereto shall fail to avail himself of such method, or if for 
any other reason there shall be a lapse in the naming of an 
arbitrator or arbitrators or umpire, or in flling a vacancy, 
then upon the application of either party to the controversy 
the court shall designate and appoint an arbitrator or arbi-
trators or umpire, as the case may require, who shall act 
under the said agreement with the same force and effect as 
if he or they had been specifcally named therein; and unless 
otherwise provided in the agreement the arbitration shall be 
by a single arbitrator.” 
Ҥ 7. Witnesses before arbitrators; fees; compelling attendance 
“The arbitrators selected either as prescribed in this title 
or otherwise, or a majority of them, may summon in writing 
any person to attend before them or any of them as a witness 
and in a proper case to bring with him or them any book, 
record, document, or paper which may be deemed material 
as evidence in the case. The fees for such attendance shall 
be the same as the fees of witnesses before masters of the 
United States courts. Said summons shall issue in the name 
of the arbitrator or arbitrators, or a majority of them, and 
shall be signed by the arbitrators, or a majority of them, and 
shall be directed to the said person and shall be served in 
the same manner as subpoenas to appear and testify before 
the court; if any person or persons so summoned to testify 
shall refuse or neglect to obey said summons, upon petition 
the United States district court for the district in which such 
arbitrators, or a majority of them, are sitting may compel 
the attendance of such person or persons before said arbitra-
tor or arbitrators, or punish said person or persons for con-
tempt in the same manner provided by law for securing the 
Page Proof Pending Publication

34 BADGEROW v. WALTERS 
Appendix to opinion of Breyer, J. 
attendance of witnesses or their punishment for neglect or 
refusal to attend in the courts of the United States.” 
Ҥ 9. Award of arbitrators; confirmation; jurisdiction; 
procedure 
“If the parties in their agreement have agreed that a judg-
ment of the court shall be entered upon the award made 
pursuant to the arbitration, and shall specify the court, then 
at any time within one year after the award is made any 
party to the arbitration may apply to the court so specifed 
for an order confrming the award, and thereupon the court 
must grant such an order unless the award is vacated, modi-
fed, or corrected as prescribed in sections 10 and 11 of this 
title. If no court is specifed in the agreement of the parties, 
then such application may be made to the United States 
court in and for the district within which such award was 
made. Notice of the application shall be served upon the 
adverse party, and thereupon the court shall have jurisdic-
tion of such party as though he had appeared generally in 
the proceeding. If the adverse party is a resident of the 
district within which the award was made, such service shall 
be made upon the adverse party or his attorney as pre-
scribed by law for service of notice of motion in an action in 
the same court. If the adverse party shall be a nonresident, 
then the notice of the application shall be served by the mar-
shal of any district within which the adverse party may be 
found in like manner as other process of the court.” 
Ҥ 10. Same; vacation; grounds; rehearing 
“(a) In any of the following cases the United States court 
in and for the district wherein the award was made may 
make an order vacating the award upon the application of 
any party to the arbitration— 
“(1) where the award was procured by corruption, fraud, 
or undue means; 
“(2) where there was evident partiality or corruption in 
the arbitrators, or either of them; 
Page Proof Pending Publication

Page Proof Pending Publication
Cite as: 596 U. S. 1 (2022) 35 
Appendix to opinion of Breyer, J. 
“(3) where the arbitrators were guilty of misconduct in 
refusing to postpone the hearing, upon suffcient cause 
shown, or in refusing to hear evidence pertinent and material 
to the controversy; or of any other misbehavior by which the 
rights of any party have been prejudiced; or 
“(4) where the arbitrators exceeded their powers, or so 
imperfectly executed them that a mutual, fnal, and defnite 
award upon the subject matter submitted was not made. 
“(b) If an award is vacated and the time within which the 
agreement required the award to be made has not expired, 
the court may, in its discretion, direct a rehearing by the 
arbitrators. 
“(c) The United States district court for the district 
wherein an award was made that was issued pursuant to 
section 580 of title 5 may make an order vacating the award 
upon the application of a person, other than a party to the 
arbitration, who is adversely affected or aggrieved by the 
award, if the use of arbitration or the award is clearly incon-
sistent with the factors set forth in section 572 of title 5.” 
Ҥ 11. Same; modifcation or correction; grounds; order 
“In either of the following cases the United States court 
in and for the district wherein the award was made may 
make an order modifying or correcting the award upon the 
application of any party to the arbitration— 
“(a) Where there was an evident material miscalcula-
tion of fgures or an evident material mistake in the descrip-
tion of any person, thing, or property referred to in the 
award. 
“(b) Where the arbitrators have awarded upon a matter 
not submitted to them, unless it is a matter not affecting the 
merits of the decision upon the matter submitted. 
“(c) Where the award is imperfect in matter of form not 
affecting the merits of the controversy. 
The order may modify and correct the award, so as to effect 
the intent thereof and promote justice between the 
parties.”

Page Proof Pending Publication
Reporter’s Note 
The attached opinion has been revised to refect the usual publication 
and citation style of the United States Reports. The revised pagination 
makes available the offcial United States Reports citation in advance of 
publication. The syllabus has been prepared by the Reporter of Decisions 
for the convenience of the reader and constitutes no part of the opinion of 
the Court. A list of counsel who argued or fled briefs in this case, and 
who were members of the bar of this Court at the time this case was 
argued, has been inserted following the syllabus. Other revisions may 
include adjustments to formatting, captions, citation form, and any errant 
punctuation. The following additional edits were made: 
None

Retrieval chunks

• #1

  PRELIMINARY PRINT Volume 596 U. S. Part 1 Pages 1–35 OFFICIAL REPORTS OF THE SUPREME COURT March 31, 2022 REBECCA A. WOMELDORF reporter of decisions Page Proof Pending Publication NOTICE: This preliminary print is subject to formal revision before the bound volume is published. Users are requested to notify…

• #2

  guing that the federal court lacked jurisdiction to resolve the parties' requests—under Sections 10 and 9 of the FAA, respectively—to vacate or confrm the award. The District Court applied Vaden's look-through approach, fnding jurisdiction in the federal-law claims contained in Badgerow's underlying employment act…

• #3

  Sections 9 and 10 of the FAA contain none of the statutory language on which Vaden relied. So under ordinary principles of statutory con- struction, the look-through method should not apply. “[W]hen Con- Page Proof Pending Publication Cite as: 596 U. S. 1 (2022) 3 Syllabus gress includes particular language in o…

• #4

  clear statutory directive.” BP p.l.c. v. Mayor and City Council of Bal- timore, 593 U. S. –––, –––. And anyway, Walters oversells the superior- ity of his proposal. First, uniformity in and of itself provides no real advantage here because courts can easily tell whether to apply look- through or the normal jurisdi…

• #5

  cial Markets Association by Thomas G. Saunders, Peter G. Neiman, Mark C. Fleming, and Eric L. Hawkins; and for Imre Stephen Szalai by Mr. Sza- lai, pro se. Page Proof Pending Publication Cite as: 596 U. S. 1 (2022) 5 Opinion of the Court we reasoned, instructs a federal court to “look through” the petition to t…

• #6

  The District Court assessed its jurisdiction under the look through approach this Court adopted in Vaden v. Discover Bank. See 2019 WL 2611127, *1 (ED La., June 26, 2019). That approach, as just noted, allows a federal court to exer- cise jurisdiction over an FAA application when the parties' underlying substanti…

• #7

  proach used in Vaden can establish jurisdiction in a case like this one—when the application before the court seeks not to compel arbitration under Section 4 but to confrm, vacate, or modify an arbitral award under other sections of the FAA. 1 We granted certiorari to resolve the confict, 593 U. S. ––– (2021), a…

• #8

  Street, 552 U. S., at 581–582; Vaden, 556 U. S., at 59. (Were it otherwise, every arbitration in the country, however dis- tant from federal concerns, could wind up in federal district court.) A federal court may entertain an action brought under the FAA only if the action has an “independent juris- dictional bas…

• #9

  the legality of Badgerow's fring but the enforceability of an arbitral award. That award is no more than a contractual resolution of the parties' dispute—a way of settling legal claims. See Vaden, 556 U. S., at 63. And quarrels about legal settlements—even settlements of federal claims—typi- cally involve only st…

• #10

  But “[j]urisdiction over what?” Ibid. “The text of Section 4,” we continued, “refers us to `the controversy between the parties.' ” Ibid. And that “controversy,” we explained, could not mean the dispute before the court about “the exist- ence or applicability of an arbitration agreement”; after all, the preceding…

• #11

  Section 4's look-through instruction in Sections 9 and 10. Or for that matter, it could have drafted a global look-through provision, applying the approach throughout the FAA. But Congress did neither. And its decision governs. Nothing in that conclusion changes because a jurisdictional question is before us. The…

• #12

  same result as in Vaden: That would indeed be jurisdictional “expan[sion] by judicial decree.” Kokkonen , 511 U. S., at 377. Walters contests that view of the statute. Unlike the Courts of Appeals to have adopted his position, including the Fifth Circuit below, see supra, at 6–7, he offers a reading of the FAA's…

• #13

  rule for all kinds of FAA applications. But Walters's understanding of Section 4 does not comport with what it says. The language of that provision never mentions “venue”; it refers only to “jurisdiction.” That is a signal, sharp and clear, that the section provides a jurisdic- tional rule. And even suppose (agai…

• #14

  tion 4 alone, rather than also in Sections 9 and 10. See supra, at 11–12. Walters's theory fares no better in construing Section 6's mention of motions to prescribe a look-through rule for the whole FAA. Here, Walters commits the opposite of his fault in reading Section 4: He now reads a provision containing no …

• #15

  rule, applying to all FAA applications alike, will necessarily promote “administrative simplicity” because a court will not have to fgure out which rule to apply. Brief for Respond- ents 27. Second, he claims, the look-through rule is “easier to apply” than a test that would ground jurisdiction on the face of the…

• #16

  over which a federal court has jurisdiction. Post, at 23. Because Section 5 is not at issue here, we do not express any view about whether the relationship that the dissent hypothesizes would give the court jurisdic- tion over the appointment request. Page Proof Pending Publication Cite as: 596 U. S. 1 (2022) 17 …

• #17

  The statutory plan, as suggested above, makes Section 9 and 10 applications conform to the normal—and sensible—judi- cial division of labor: The applications go to state, rather than federal, courts when they raise claims between non-diverse parties involving state law. See supra, at 8–9. As Walters notes, those …

• #18

  It is so ordered. Justice Breyer, dissenting. When interpreting a statute, it is often helpful to consider not simply the statute's literal words, but also the statute's purposes and the likely consequences of our interpretation. Otherwise, we risk adopting an interpretation that, even if consistent with text, c…

• #19

  tions' language seems explicitly to give federal courts the power to take such actions. Why does that language itself not also grant jurisdiction to act? The answer, as the Court notes, is that we have held that the FAA's “authorization of a petition does not itself create jurisdiction.” Ante, at 4. “Rather, the …

• #20

  rious practical consequences,” including unduly limiting the scope of Section 4 and hinging jurisdiction upon distinctions that were “ `totally artifcial.' ” Ibid. (quoting 1 I. MacNeil, R. Speidel, & T. Stipanowich, Federal Arbitration Law § 9.2.3.3, p. 9:21 (1995) (hereinafter MacNeil)). Today, the majority hol…

• #21

  raises a federal question, but the application to appoint an arbitrator raises no federal question and does not establish diversity? A party could ask a federal judge to order arbi- tration under Section 4, but they could not then ask that same (or any other) federal judge to appoint an arbitrator for that very s…

• #22

  arbitration). And assume that a federal court fnds it does Page Proof Pending Publication 24 BADGEROW v. WALTERS Breyer, J., dissenting have jurisdiction over a Section 7 request, even though the underlying controversy involves neither a federal question nor diversity. “Why would Congress have wanted federal co…

• #23

  order resulting from that arbitration under Section 9, 10, or 11. But why prohibit a federal court from considering the results of the very arbitration it has ordered and is likely familiar with? Why force the parties to obtain relief—con- cerning arbitration of an underlying federal-question dis- pute—from a sta…

• #24

  the same can be said for Section 4 disputes about the enforce- ability of arbitration agreements. These, too, typically in- volve only questions of state law. That the dispute does not implicate federal questions thus does not explain why Con- gress would have wanted more federal court involvement at the Section …

• #25

  Moses H. Cone Memorial Hospital v. Mercury Constr. Corp., 460 U. S. 1, 23 (1983)); see also id., at 22 (“Congress' clear intent, in the Arbitration Act, [was] to move the parties to an arbitrable dispute out of court and into arbitration as quickly and easily as possible”). We have thus interpreted the FAA to avo…

• #26

  arbitrator, simply refers to “the court.” Those words, most naturally read, refer to the same court to which the immedi- ately preceding section—Section 4—refers: a “United States district court” with jurisdiction as determined by the look- through approach. Requests under the FAA's various sec- tions are also ge…

• #27

  The FAA's legislative history reinforces the view of the statute that I have just described. The Senate Report on the bill that became the FAA refers to the FAA's general purposes. It makes clear Congress' hope to avoid proce- dural complexity. It refers to parties' “desire to avoid the delay and expense of litig…

• #28

  statute that I would adopt. It suggests that Congress in- tended a single approach for determining jurisdiction of the Page Proof Pending Publication Cite as: 596 U. S. 1 (2022) 31 Appendix to opinion of Breyer, J. FAA's interrelated enforcement mechanisms, not one ap- proach for the mechanism provided in Sectio…

• #29

  notice in writing of such application shall be served upon the party in default. Service thereof shall be made in the man- ner provided by the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. The court shall hear the parties, and upon being satisfed that the making of the agreement for arbitration or the failure to comply there…

• #30

  trators or umpire, as the case may require, who shall act under the said agreement with the same force and effect as if he or they had been specifcally named therein; and unless otherwise provided in the agreement the arbitration shall be by a single arbitrator.” “§ 7. Witnesses before arbitrators; fees; compelli…

• #31

  adverse party, and thereupon the court shall have jurisdic- tion of such party as though he had appeared generally in the proceeding. If the adverse party is a resident of the district within which the award was made, such service shall be made upon the adverse party or his attorney as pre- scribed by law for ser…

• #32

  “(a) Where there was an evident material miscalcula- tion of fgures or an evident material mistake in the descrip- tion of any person, thing, or property referred to in the award. “(b) Where the arbitrators have awarded upon a matter not submitted to them, unless it is a matter not affecting the merits of the de…