It seems difficult to find an equal protection violation if the Court is merely enforcing the contract. It seems to me that a more likely constitutional objection would be that the contract cannot be enforced without running afoul of the neutral principles doctrine. Can a court make a decision about who is or is not a Muslim without making theological choices? Would a shia muslim be acceptable? A member of the nation of Islam? ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Nathan B. Oman Associate Professor William & Mary Law School P.O. Box 8795 Williamsburg, VA 23187 (757) 221-3919
"I beseech you, in the bowels of Christ, think it possible you may be mistaken." -Oliver Cromwell On Mon, Jan 3, 2011 at 10:06 AM, Volokh, Eugene <vol...@law.ucla.edu> wrote: > That’s the issue lurking in *In re Aramco Servs. > Co.*<http://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=11521915190435651264>, > now on appeal to the Texas Supreme Court. DynCorp and Aramco Services (both > of which were at the time Delaware corporations headquartered in Houston, > though Aramco Services is a subsidiary of Saudi > Aramco<https://www.aramcoservices.com/about/>, > the Saudi government’s oil company) signed an agreement under which DynCorp > was to create a computer system (in the U.S.) and install it at Aramco’s > Saudi facilities. The contract provided that it was to be interpreted under > Saudi law, and arbitrated under Saudi arbitration rules and regulations. > Those rules and regulations apparently call for the arbitrators to be Muslim > Saudi citizens. The trial court, however, appointed a three-arbitrator panel > consisting of a Muslim (apparently a Saudi) and two non-Muslim non-Saudis. > Aramco appealed, arguing that (1) under the contract the arbitrators were > not supposed to be appointed by a court, and, (2) in the alternative, that > the court erred in appointing non-Muslim non-Saudis. > > > > The Texas Court of Appeals agreed with Aramco on item 1, and therefore > didn’t reach item 2. But there is an interesting constitutional issue > lurking in the background: If a contract does call for a court to appoint > arbitrators, and provides that the arbitrators must be Muslims (or Jews or > Catholics or what have you), may a court implement that provision, or does > the First Amendment or the Equal Protection Clause bar the court — a > government entity — from discriminating based on religion this way, even > pursuant to a party agreement? Any thoughts on this? > > > > Eugene > > > > _______________________________________________ > To post, send message to Religionlaw@lists.ucla.edu > To subscribe, unsubscribe, change options, or get password, see > http://lists.ucla.edu/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/religionlaw > > Please note that messages sent to this large list cannot be viewed as > private. Anyone can subscribe to the list and read messages that are > posted; people can read the Web archives; and list members can (rightly or > wrongly) forward the messages to others. >
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