Justices hear case on class-action arbitration

On Nov 9, the Supreme Court took up a couple's complaint that they were charged $30.32 for a phone that was supposed to be free. The case has been billed as one of the court's most important on consumer rights in years, with civil rights organizations and consumer groups on one side and, on the other, businesses worried about the costs of lawyer-driven class-action suits.

The first group said individual claims are too small to interest lawyers or even other consumers who may have been cheated. But the overcharges could add up to millions of dollars for the company, and the only way to stop such and to punish the company is for customers to band together. The businesses, on the other hand, argue that the costs that come with such suits are so great that companies must settle even when they have done nothing wrong, and that lawyers, rather than consumers, benefit from the huge settlements. But what had been billed as an epic battle played out during the one-hour oral argument more like a law school seminar on contract law: Phrases such as "contract of adhesion," "obstacle preemption" and "unconscionability" dominated the debate. The justices' questions suggested a more limited ruling on the facts of the specific case rather than the broad decision on class-action suits that the 26 groups submitting friend-of-the-court briefs had addressed.