Viking River Cruises v. Moriana

Angie Moriana (plaintiff) worked for Viking River Cruises, Inc. (Viking) (defendant). Moriana signed an arbitration agreement that purported to waive her ability to bring a class, collective, or representative action under California’s Private Attorneys General Act (PAGA). The waiver also included a severability term, which presumed that if the waiver were partially invalidated, the representative component of any claim would be tried in court, and the individual claim would be arbitrated. California enacted the PAGA to improve enforcement of the state’s labor law by authorizing suits to recover civil penalties that only California previously could have pursued. The PAGA allowed claim joinder, i.e., the aggregation of multiple claims against a former employer in a single proceeding, even if the other claims were unrelated to the plaintiff’s individual grievance. Upon leaving Viking, Moriana sued Viking under the PAGA in California state court. Moriana’s individual claim concerned Viking’s alleged failure to pay Moriana on time, but Moriana also alleged that Viking failed to pay the minimum wage or overtime to other employees. Viking moved to compel arbitration of the individual PAGA claim and to dismiss the representative claims. The trial court denied Viking’s motion. The California Court of Appeal affirmed based on California rules invalidating waivers of the ability to bring representative PAGA claims and prohibiting the splitting of PAGA claims into separate individual and representative actions. Viking appealed to the United States Supreme Court. Per Viking, PAGA claims were comparable to class-action claims, which § 2 of the Federal Arbitration Act (FAA) did not permit to be arbitrated without the parties’ consent. Thus, Viking contended that the FAA preempted California’s rule barring the waiver of PAGA rights. Moriana responded that the PAGA merely created a new cause of action and that the FAA did not require courts to enforce waivers of substantive rights and remedies.