Kavanaugh authors first Supreme Court opinion in unanimous ruling

WASHINGTON – Justice Brett Kavanaugh issued his first Supreme Court opinion Tuesday, an easy lift for an experienced judge writing for unanimous colleagues in a noncontroversial case.

It involved one company suing another about who decides whether certain disputes should be settled by arbitration. The answer was that an arbitrator, rather than a judge, should make the decision in contracts calling for arbitration.

Kavanaugh’s debut as author came in front of only seven of his colleagues. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, recuperating from cancer surgery last month, remained at home. Chief Justice John Roberts has said she will participate by reading transcripts of the oral arguments and the briefing in the cases she misses.

It is customary for new justices to receive relatively noncontroversial cases for their debuts, and Kavanaugh’s fit that bill. His opinion did not delve into the merits of the dispute between a dental equipment manufacturer and its distributor, or even into the details of the arbitration contract they had signed.

Instead, it looked at whether it was correct for judges to decide arbitrability questions “if the argument that the arbitration agreement applies to the particular dispute is ‘wholly groundless.’ “

Kavanaugh said a reading of the Federal Arbitration Act supplied the answer.