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Page Number: 6

4 

SMITH v. SPIZZIRRI 

Opinion of the Court 

of the action until such arbitration has been had in ac-
cordance  with  the  terms  of  the  agreement,  providing
the applicant for the stay is not in default in proceeding 
with such arbitration.” 

Here, as in other contexts, the use of the word “shall” “cre-
ates an obligation impervious to judicial discretion.”  Lex-
econ  Inc.  v.  Milberg  Weiss  Bershad  Hynes  &  Lerach,  523 
U. S.  26,  35  (1998).    That  plain  statutory  text  requires  a 
court to stay the proceeding.  See Maine Community Health 
Options v. United States, 590 U. S. 296, 310 (2020) (“ ‘Unlike
the word “may,” which implies discretion, the word “shall” 
usually connotes a requirement’ ”).  Indeed, this Court pre-
viously noted that the use of “shall” in neighboring sections 
of  the  FAA  created  a  mandatory  obligation  that  left  “no
place for the exercise of discretion by a district court.”  Dean 
Witter Reynolds Inc. v. Byrd, 470 U. S. 213, 218 (1985) (dis-
cussing §§2–4 and explaining that the FAA “mandates that 
district courts shall direct the parties to proceed to arbitra-
tion  on  issues  as  to  which  an  arbitration  agreement  has
been signed”).  The same is true here.  When §3 says that a 
court “shall . . . stay” the proceeding, the court must do so. 
Just  as  “shall”  means  “shall,”  “stay”  means  “stay.”    Re-
spondents insist that “stay” in §3 “means only that the court 
must  stop  parallel  in-court  litigation,  which  a  court  may 
achieve by dismissing without retaining jurisdiction.”  Brief 
for  Respondents  15.  There  are,  however,  two  significant
problems with that reading.  First, it disregards the long-
established legal meaning of the word “stay.”  Even at the 
time  of  the  enactment  of  the  FAA,  that  term  denoted  the 
“temporary  suspension”  of  legal  proceedings,  not  the  con-
clusive termination of such proceedings.  Black’s Law Dic-
tionary 1109 (2d ed. 1910) (“Stay of proceedings”).  Second, 
respondents’  attempt  to  read  “stay”  to  include  “dismiss” 
cannot be squared with the surrounding statutory text.  By