Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/529bv.pdf
Page Number: 268

529US1

Unit: $U37

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OCTOBER TERM, 1999

193

Syllabus

CORTEZ BYRD CHIPS, INC. v. BILL HARBERT
CONSTRUCTION CO., A DIVISION OF BILL
HARBERT INTERNATIONAL, INC.

certiorari to the united states court of appeals for
the eleventh circuit

No. 98–1960. Argued January 10, 2000—Decided March 21, 2000

Petitioner Cortez Byrd Chips, Inc., and respondent Bill Harbert Construc-
tion Company agreed, inter alia, that any disputes arising from Har-
bert’s construction of a Mississippi mill for Cortez Byrd would be decided
by arbitration. When such a dispute arose, arbitration was conducted
in Alabama and Harbert received an award. Cortez Byrd sought to
vacate or modify the award in the Federal District Court for the South-
ern District of Mississippi, where the contract was performed; and seven
days later Harbert sought to conﬁrm the award in the Northern District
of Alabama. The latter court refused to dismiss, transfer, or stay its
action, concluding that venue was proper only there, and it entered judg-
ment for Harbert. The Eleventh Circuit held that, under the Federal
Arbitration Act (FAA), venue for motions to conﬁrm, vacate, or modify
awards was exclusively in the district where the arbitration award was
made, and thus venue here was limited to the Alabama court.

Held: The FAA’s venue provisions are permissive, allowing a motion to
conﬁrm, vacate, or modify to be brought either in the district where
the award was made or in any district proper under the general venue
statute. Pp. 197–204.

(a) Cortez Byrd’s Mississippi motion was clearly proper as a diversity
action under the general venue statute, 28 U. S. C. § 1391(a)(2), because
it was ﬁled where the contract was performed. However, the FAA pro-
vides that upon motion of an arbitration party, the federal district court
where the arbitration award was made “may” vacate, 9 U. S. C. § 10,
If these provisions are
or “may” modify or correct, § 11, the award.
restrictive, supplanting rather than supplementing the general venue
statute, there was no Mississippi venue for Cortez Byrd’s action.
Owing to their contemporaneous enactment and similar language, §§ 10
and 11 are best analyzed together with § 9, which permits parties to
select the venue for conﬁrmation of an award and provides that, in the
absence of an agreement, venue lies in the federal court for the district
where the award was made. Pp. 197–198.

(b) Parsing the language of §§ 9–11 does not answer the question
whether the provisions are restrictive or permissive, for there is lan-