Pacificare Health Systems, Inc. v. Book

• Decision Date: 07 April 2003
• Docket Number: No. 02-215.,02-215.
• Parties: PACIFICARE HEALTH SYSTEMS, INC., ET AL. v. BOOK ET AL.
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

538 U.S. 401

PACIFICARE HEALTH SYSTEMS, INC., ET AL. v. BOOK ET AL.

No. 02-215.

Supreme Court of United States.

Argued February 24, 2003.

Decided April 7, 2003.

Respondent physicians filed suit alleging that managed-health-care organizations, including petitioners, violated, inter alia, the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) by failing to reimburse them for health-care services that they had provided to patients covered by the organizations' plans. Petitioners moved to compel arbitration. The District Court refused to compel arbitration of the RICO claims on the ground that the arbitration clauses in the parties' agreements prohibited awards of "punitive damages," and hence an arbitrator lacked authority to award treble damages under RICO. Accordingly, the court deemed the arbitration agreements unenforceable with respect to those claims. The Eleventh Circuit affirmed.

Held: It is unclear whether the agreements actually prevent an arbitrator from awarding treble damages under RICO. This Court's cases have placed different statutory treble damages provisions on different points along the spectrum between purely compensatory and strictly punitive awards. In particular, the Court has repeatedly acknowledged that RICO's treble-damages provision is remedial in nature, and it is not clear that the parties intended the term "punitive" to encompass claims for treble damages under RICO. Since the Court does not know how the arbitrator will construe the remedial limitations, the questions whether they render the parties' agreement unenforceable and whether it is for courts or arbitrators to decide enforceability in the first instance are unusually abstract. It would be premature for the Court to address them; the proper course is to compel arbitration. Pp. 403-407.

285 F. 3d 971, reversed and remanded.

SCALIA, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which all other Members joined, except THOMAS, J., who took no part in the consideration or decision of the case.

CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT.

William E. Grauer argued the cause for petitioners. With him on the briefs were Christopher R. J. Pace, James W. Quinn, Jeffrey S. Klein, Edward Soto, and Gregory S. Coleman.

Joe R. Whatley, Jr., argued the cause for respondents. With him on the brief were Charlene P. Ford and James B. Tilghman, Jr.^*

JUSTICE SCALIA delivered the opinion of the Court.

In this case, we are asked to decide whether respondents can be compelled to arbitrate claims arising under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO), 18 U. S. C. § 1961 et seq., notwithstanding the fact that the parties' arbitration agreements may be construed to limit the arbitrator's authority to award damages under that statute.

I

Respondents are members of a group of physicians who filed suit against managed-health-care organizations including petitioners PacifiCare Health Systems, Inc., and PacifiCare Operations, Inc. (collectively, PacifiCare), and United-Healthcare, Inc., and United Health Group Inc. (collectively, United). These physicians alleged that the defendants unlawfully failed to reimburse them for health-care services that they had provided to patients covered by defendants' health plans. They brought causes of action under RICO, the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA), and federal and state prompt-pay statutes, as well as claims for breach of contract, unjust enrichment, and in quantum meruit. In re: Managed Care Litigation, 132 F. Supp. 2d 989, 992 (SD Fla. 2000).

Of particular concern here, PacifiCare and United moved the District Court to compel arbitration, arguing that provisions in their contracts with respondents required arbitration of these disputes, including those arising under RICO. Ibid. Respondents opposed the motion on the ground that, because the arbitration provisions prohibit an award of punitive damages, see App. 107, 147, 168, 212, respondents could not obtain "meaningful relief" in arbitration for their claims under the RICO statute, which authorizes treble damages, 18 U. S. C. § 1964(c). See Paladino v. Avnet Computer Technologies, Inc., 134 F. 3d 1054, 1062 (CA11 1998) (holding that where a remedial limitation in an arbitration agreement prevents a plaintiff from obtaining "meaningful relief" for a statutory claim, the agreement to arbitrate is unenforceable with respect to that claim).

The District Court denied petitioners' request to compel arbitration of the RICO claims. 132 F. Supp. 2d, at 1007. The court concluded that given the remedial limitations in the relevant contracts, it was, indeed, "faced with a potential Paladino situation ..., where the plaintiff may not be able to obtain meaningful relief for allegations of statutory violations in an arbitration forum." Id., at 1005. Accordingly, it found the arbitration agreements unenforceable with respect to respondents' RICO claims. Id., at 1007. The Eleventh Circuit affirmed "for the reasons set forth in [the District Court's] comprehensive opinion," In re: Humana Inc. Managed Care Litigation, 285 F. 3d 971, 973 (2002), and we granted certiorari, 537 U. S. 946 (2002).

II

Petitioners argue that whether the remedial limitations render their arbitration agreements unenforceable is not a question of "arbitrability," and hence should have been decided by an arbitrator, rather than a court, in the first instance. They also claim that even if this question is one of arbitrability, and is therefore properly within the purview of the courts at this time, the remedial limitations at issue do not require invalidation of their arbitration agreements. Either way, petitioners contend, the lower courts should have compelled arbitration. We conclude that it would be premature for us to address these questions at this time.

Our decision in Vimar Seguros y Reaseguros, S. A. v. M/V Sky Reefer, 515 U. S. 528 (1995), supplies the analytic framework for assessing the ripeness of this dispute. In Vimar, we dealt with a bill of lading concerning a shipment of goods from Morocco to Massachusetts. Upon receipt of the goods, the purchaser discovered that they had been damaged, and, along with its insurer (Vimar), filed suit against the shipper. The shipper sought to compel arbitration, relying on choice-of-law and arbitration clauses in the bill of lading under which disputes arising out of the parties' agreement were to be governed by Japanese law and resolved through arbitration before the Tokyo Maritime Arbitration Commission. Vimar countered by arguing that the arbitration clause violated the Carriage of Goods by Sea Act (COGSA), 46 U. S. C. App. § 1300 et seq., and hence was unenforceable. 515 U. S., at 531-532. In particular, Vimar claimed that "there is no guarantee foreign arbitrators will apply COGSA"; that the foreign arbitrator was likely to apply rules of Japanese law under which respondents' liability might be less than what it would be under COGSA; and that this would violate "[t]he central guarantee of [COGSA] § 3(8) ... that the terms of a bill of lading may not relieve the carrier of obligations or diminish the legal duties specified by the Act." Id., at 539.

Notwithstanding Vimar's insistence that the arbitration agreement violated federal policy as embodied in COGSA, we declined to reach the issue and held that the arbitration clause was, at least initially, enforceable. "At this interlocutory stage," we explained, "it is not established what law the arbitrators will apply to petitioner's claims or that petitioner will receive diminished protection as a result. The arbitrators may conclude that COGSA applies of its own force or that Japanese law does not apply so that, under another clause of the bill of lading, COGSA controls." Id., at 540. We further emphasized that "mere speculation that the foreign arbitrators might apply Japanese law which, depending on the proper construction of COGSA, might reduce respondents' legal obligations, does not in and of itself lessen liability under COGSA § 3(8)," nor did it provide an adequate basis upon which to declare the relevant arbitration agreement unenforceable. Id., at 541 (emphases added). We found that "[w]hatever the merits of petitioner's comparative reading of COGSA and its Japanese counterpart, its claim is premature." Id., at 540.

The case at bar arrives in a similar posture. Two of the four arbitration agreements at issue provide that "punitive damages shall not be awarded [in arbitration]," App. 107, 147; one provides that "[t]he arbitrators ... shall have no authority to award any punitive or exemplary damages," id., at 212; and one provides that "[t]he arbitrators ... shall have no authority to award extra contractual damages of any kind, including punitive or exemplary damages ...," id., at 168. Respondents insist, and the District Court agreed, 132 F. Supp. 2d, at 1000-1001, 1005, that these provisions preclude an arbitrator from awarding treble damages under RICO. We think that neither our precedents nor the ambiguous terms of the contracts make this clear.

Our cases have placed different statutory treble-damages provisions on different points along the spectrum between purely compensatory and strictly punitive awards. Thus, in Vermont Agency of Natural Resources v. United States ex rel. Stevens, 529 U. S. 765, 784 (2000), we characterized the treble-damages provision of the False Claims Act, 31 U. S. C. §§ 3729-3733, as "essentially punitive in nature." In Brunswick Corp. v. Pueblo Bowl-O-Mat, Inc., 429 U. S. 477, 485 (1977), on the other hand, we explained that the treble-damages provision...