An arbitration clause moves your claim to a different forum; it does not delete the claim — and Minnesota's own attempt to void these clauses was held preempted in 1995

What the clause does, stated from the two statutes that make it enforceable

An arbitration clause is a forum-selection term. Two statutes give it force in Minnesota, and they are drafted in almost identical language.

9 U.S.C. § 2, the operative section of the Federal Arbitration Act:

A written provision in any maritime transaction or a contract evidencing a transaction involving commerce to settle by arbitration a controversy thereafter arising out of such contract or transaction, or the refusal to perform the whole or any part thereof, or an agreement in writing to submit to arbitration an existing controversy arising out of such a contract, transaction, or refusal, shall be valid, irrevocable, and enforceable, save upon such grounds as exist at law or in equity for the revocation of any contract or as otherwise provided in chapter 4.

Minn. Stat. § 572B.06(a), the Minnesota Revised Uniform Arbitration Act:

An agreement contained in a record to submit to arbitration any existing or subsequent controversy arising between the parties to the agreement is valid, enforceable, and irrevocable except upon a ground that exists at law or in equity for the revocation of contract.

Both put arbitration agreements on the same footing as other contracts and no better. The grounds that revoke any contract — the ones the savings clause preserves — remain available. What neither statute does is decide the merits of anything.

The closing words of § 2, “or as otherwise provided in chapter 4,” were added in 2022, and chapter 4 was enacted by the Ending Forced Arbitration of Sexual Assault and Sexual Harassment Act of 2021, Pub. L. 117-90, discussed below.

Johnson v. Piper Jaffray, and exactly what it decided

Johnson involved a corporate bond trader who brought Human Rights Act age and gender discrimination claims and a defamation claim against her former employer. She had signed a Uniform Application for Securities Industry Registration or Transfer — a Form U-4 — containing an agreement to arbitrate. Johnson, 530 N.W.2d at 792–93. The employer moved to compel arbitration; the district court refused; the court of appeals reversed; and the supreme court affirmed the court of appeals. Id. at 793.

The part of the decision that reaches beyond securities registration is Part C, and its heading states the holding: “The FAA pre-empts the MHRA to the extent the MHRA voids agreements that purport to waive the right to a judicial forum.” Id. at 803. The court quoted § 2 of the FAA, applied the rule of Perry v. Thomas, 482 U.S. 483, 492–93 n.9 (1987), that “[a] state-law principle that takes its meaning precisely from the fact that a contract to arbitrate is at issue does not comport with this requirement of § 2,” and concluded, at 803–04:

The MHRA embodies a judicial enforcement process, and voids agreements that purport to waive the right to a judicial forum. See Minn.Stat. §§ 363.031, 363.14 (1992). In the present context, the voiding provision of the MHRA takes its meaning precisely from the fact that a contract to arbitrate is at issue. As such, the voiding provision of the MHRA conflicts with the FAA, and accordingly, the FAA pre-empts it.

Then, at 804, it applied Gilmer’s premise to the Human Rights Act specifically: “The same reasoning applies to an agreement to arbitrate a claim brought under the MHRA. Thus, we conclude that the arbitration agreement is enforceable under the FAA, notwithstanding the MHRA’s embrace of a judicial enforcement process.”

The statute Johnson named as § 363.031 is now § 363A.31, and the revisor prints a note keyed to subdivision 1:

NOTE: Subdivision 1 (formerly section 363.031) was found preempted by federal law with regard to arbitration agreements in Johnson v. Piper Jaffray, Inc., 530 N.W.2d 790 (Minn. 1995).

Two limits belong next to that holding rather than after it. First, Johnson’s vehicle was a Form U-4 rather than an employment contract. Gilmer had said of the same form that “it would be inappropriate to address the scope of the § 1 exclusion because the arbitration clause being enforced here is not contained in a contract of employment,” the clause being instead in “Gilmer’s securities registration application, which is a contract with the securities exchanges, not with Interstate.” Gilmer, 500 U.S. at 25 n.2. Second, Johnson said the same thing about itself: “we need not evaluate the scope of the exclusion contained in Section 1 because Johnson’s contention that the Form U-4 constitutes a contract of employment fails at the threshold.” Johnson, 530 N.W.2d at 794–95. A question a court declines to reach is not a question it has decided.

The § 1 exclusion, and how narrow the Supreme Court made it

9 U.S.C. § 1 closes with the clause employees are most often told about:

[B]ut nothing herein contained shall apply to contracts of employment of seamen, railroad employees, or any other class of workers engaged in foreign or interstate commerce.

Read on its own, “any other class of workers engaged in foreign or interstate commerce” sounds like most of the workforce. The Supreme Court decided otherwise in Circuit City Stores, Inc. v. Adams, 532 U.S. 105 (2001) — a case about a retail sales counselor who signed an arbitration agreement in a job application and later sued under California’s discrimination statute. At 109 the Court stated its holding:

We now decide that the better interpretation is to construe the statute, as most of the Courts of Appeals have done, to confine the exemption to transportation workers.

The reasoning was textual. Construing the residual phrase to cover all employment contracts “runs into an immediate and, in our view, insurmountable textual obstacle,” because “there would be no need for Congress to use the phrases ‘seamen’ and ‘railroad employees’ if those same classes of workers were subsumed within the meaning of the ‘engaged in … commerce’ residual clause.” Id. at 114. The Court added that “[t]he plain meaning of the words ‘engaged in commerce’ is narrower than the more open-ended formulations ‘affecting commerce’ and ‘involving commerce.’” Id. at 118.

Circuit City was read in full from the Caselaw Access Project archive of 532 U.S. Whether any later Supreme Court decision has refined how the transportation-worker category is identified is [UNVERIFIED] on this page — CourtListener’s daily quota was exhausted on September 8, 2026, no case-law search was run, and no citator was consulted.

What chapter 572B actually gives you

Minnesota’s act is not merely a rubber stamp, and several of its provisions run in the employee’s direction.

It cannot be contracted around in the places that matter. Section 572B.04(b) provides that before a controversy arises, the parties may not waive or vary § 572B.06(a), among others; may not “unreasonably restrict the right under section 572B.09 to notice of the initiation of an arbitration proceeding”; may not “unreasonably restrict the right under section 572B.12 to disclosure of any facts by a neutral arbitrator”; and may not waive “the right under section 572B.16 of a party to an agreement to arbitrate to be represented by a lawyer at any proceeding or hearing under sections 572B.01 to 572B.31,” except that an employer and a labor organization may waive lawyer representation in a labor arbitration. Paragraph (c) makes a second list nonwaivable at any time, including § 572B.07 (motions to compel or stay), § 572B.22 (confirmation), § 572B.23 (vacatur), and § 572B.24 (modification).

A court, not the arbitrator, decides whether you agreed. Section 572B.06(b): “The court shall decide whether an agreement to arbitrate exists or a controversy is subject to an agreement to arbitrate, except in the case of a grievance arising under a collective bargaining agreement when an arbitrator shall decide.” Paragraph (c) sends the other questions the other way — an arbitrator decides “whether a condition precedent to arbitrability has been fulfilled and whether a contract containing a valid agreement to arbitrate is enforceable.”

The merits are not a defense to arbitration. Section 572B.07(c): “The court may not refuse to order arbitration because the claim subject to arbitration lacks merit or grounds for the claim have not been established.” That cuts both ways, and it is worth reading as a limit on the employer as much as on the employee.

The remedies follow the claim. Section 572B.21 is quoted above; paragraph (e) adds that an arbitrator awarding punitive damages “shall specify in the award the basis in fact justifying and the basis in law authorizing the award and state separately the amount of the punitive damages or other exemplary relief.”

The award is reviewable, on six statutory grounds. Section 572B.23(a) requires a court to vacate an award if:

(1) the award was procured by corruption, fraud, or other undue means;

(2) there was:

(A) evident partiality by an arbitrator appointed as a neutral;

(B) corruption by an arbitrator; or

(C) misconduct by an arbitrator prejudicing the rights of a party to the arbitration proceeding;

(3) an arbitrator refused to postpone the hearing upon showing of sufficient cause for postponement, refused to consider evidence material to the controversy, or otherwise conducted the hearing contrary to section 572B.15, so as to prejudice substantially the rights of a party to the arbitration proceeding;

(4) an arbitrator exceeded the arbitrator’s powers;

(5) there was no agreement to arbitrate, unless the person participated in the arbitration proceeding without raising the objection under section 572B.15, subsection (c), not later than the commencement of the arbitration hearing; or

(6) the arbitration was conducted without proper notice of the initiation of an arbitration as required in section 572B.09 so as to prejudice substantially the rights of a party to the arbitration proceeding.

Note what is not on that list: the arbitrator got the law wrong, or got the facts wrong. Paragraph (b) sets the deadline at 90 days after the movant receives notice of the award, or 90 days after a corruption, fraud, or undue-means ground “is known or by the exercise of reasonable care should have been known.” Paragraph (d) provides that if a motion to vacate is denied and no motion to modify is pending, “the court shall confirm the award.”

Section 572B.25(c) allows a court, on application of a prevailing party to a contested proceeding to confirm, vacate, or modify, to add “attorney fees and other reasonable expenses of litigation incurred in a judicial proceeding after the award is made.” Section 572B.28 lists what may be appealed, including “an order denying a motion to compel arbitration” and “an order vacating an award without directing a rehearing.” And § 572B.03 sets the act’s reach: it governs agreements entered into on or after August 1, 2011, and “[o]n or after August 1, 2011, sections 572B.01 to 572B.31 govern agreements to arbitrate even if the arbitration agreement was entered into prior to August 1, 2011.”

What the Human Rights Act says about arbitration — the search, and the result

The full text of chapter 363A was retrieved from the revisor on September 8, 2026 and searched for “arbitrat.” It returns two occurrences, and neither is a provision governing employment arbitration agreements.

The first is § 363A.28, subd. 3(b), which treats arbitration as one of the processes that pauses the Act’s one-year filing period:

The running of the one-year limitation period is suspended during the time a potential charging party and respondent are voluntarily engaged in a dispute resolution process involving a claim of unlawful discrimination under this chapter, including arbitration, conciliation, mediation or grievance procedures pursuant to a collective bargaining agreement or statutory, charter, ordinance provisions for a civil service or other employment system or a school board sexual harassment or sexual violence policy.

The paperwork burden for that suspension sits on the employer, and the deadline mechanics are worked through in the discrimination-deadline guide and the deadline table.

The second is the revisor’s NOTE to § 363A.31 quoted above — a record of Johnson, not an enactment.

So the honest answer is that chapter 363A contains no provision addressed to whether an employment arbitration agreement is enforceable. The provision that once did that work, § 363A.31, subd. 1, still reads that a contractual provision purporting to waive a chapter 363A right prospectively “is contrary to public policy and void,” and it still carries the revisor’s note recording that it was held preempted as to arbitration agreements.

The Act’s fee provision is § 363A.33, subd. 7:

In any action or proceeding brought pursuant to this section the court, in its discretion, may allow the prevailing party a reasonable attorney’s fee as part of the costs.

Read the words the subdivision uses. It speaks of “any action or proceeding brought pursuant to this section” and of “the court.” Whether it operates of its own force inside an arbitration is [UNVERIFIED] here; no retrieved source decides it. What does operate is Minn. Stat. § 572B.21(b), which authorizes the arbitrator to award attorney fees and other reasonable expenses of arbitration “if such an award is authorized by law in a civil action involving the same claim or by the agreement of the parties to the arbitration proceeding.” That is the provision that carries a statutory fee entitlement across the forum line, and it is Minnesota’s own.

The 2022 federal statute that gives one election back

Congress removed one category of dispute from predispute arbitration entirely. 9 U.S.C. § 402(a):

Notwithstanding any other provision of this title, at the election of the person alleging conduct constituting a sexual harassment dispute or sexual assault dispute, or the named representative of a class or in a collective action alleging such conduct, no predispute arbitration agreement or predispute joint-action waiver shall be valid or enforceable with respect to a case which is filed under Federal, Tribal, or State law and relates to the sexual assault dispute or the sexual harassment dispute.

Four features of that sentence are worth separating. It runs “at the election of the person alleging” the conduct — the employee chooses, and the clause is not void on its own. It reaches a “predispute joint-action waiver” as well as a predispute arbitration agreement, and § 401(2) defines that as an agreement “that would prohibit, or waive the right of, one of the parties to the agreement to participate in a joint, class, or collective action in a judicial, arbitral, administrative, or other forum, concerning a dispute that has not yet arisen at the time of the making of the agreement.” It applies to a case “filed under Federal, Tribal, or State law,” which includes a Human Rights Act case. And it reaches only predispute agreements — § 401(1) defines a “predispute arbitration agreement” as “any agreement to arbitrate a dispute that had not yet arisen at the time of the making of the agreement.”

Section 402(b) takes the gatekeeping away from the arbitrator:

An issue as to whether this chapter applies with respect to a dispute shall be determined under Federal law. The applicability of this chapter to an agreement to arbitrate and the validity and enforceability of an agreement to which this chapter applies shall be determined by a court, rather than an arbitrator, irrespective of whether the party resisting arbitration challenges the arbitration agreement specifically or in conjunction with other terms of the contract containing such agreement, and irrespective of whether the agreement purports to delegate such determinations to an arbitrator.

The definitions bound it. A “sexual harassment dispute” under § 401(4) is “a dispute relating to conduct that is alleged to constitute sexual harassment under applicable Federal, Tribal, or State law.” A “sexual assault dispute” under § 401(3) is “a dispute involving a nonconsensual sexual act or sexual contact, as such terms are defined in section 2246 of title 18 or similar applicable Tribal or State law, including when the victim lacks capacity to consent.” And the timing rule is in § 3 of Pub. L. 117-90, printed by the Legal Information Institute as an effective-date note to § 401: the Act “shall apply with respect to any dispute or claim that arises or accrues on or after the date of enactment of this Act,” March 3, 2022. A dispute that arose before that date is outside it.

One Minnesota provision that reaches arbitration by name

Minn. Stat. § 181.988, subd. 3, added with the 2023 noncompete ban, restricts what an employer may require of an employee “who primarily resides and works in Minnesota, as a condition of employment”:

(1) require the employee to adjudicate outside of Minnesota a claim arising in Minnesota; or

(2) deprive the employee of the substantive protection of Minnesota law with respect to a controversy arising in Minnesota.

Paragraph (b) makes a provision that violates paragraph (a) “voidable at any time by the employee,” and directs that if it is voided at the employee’s request, “the matter shall be adjudicated in Minnesota and Minnesota law shall govern the dispute.” Paragraph (c) allows a court to award reasonable attorney fees to an employee enforcing the section. Paragraph (d) is the sentence that brings arbitration inside: “For purposes of this section, adjudication includes litigation and arbitration.”

Paragraph (e) is the limit, and it is the reason this section is described here rather than relied on: “This subdivision applies only to claims arising under this section.” Whether a court reads that sentence to confine subdivision 3 to claims under § 181.988 itself is [UNVERIFIED] on this page; no decision construing it was retrieved. The ban that subdivision 3 travels with is covered in the noncompete guide.

Currency, and what this page does not do

The revisor’s History lines were read on each Minnesota section cited: § 572B.03, “2010 c 264 art 1 s 3,33”; § 572B.04, “2010 c 264 art 1 s 4,33; 2014 c 275 art 1 s 127”; § 572B.06, “2010 c 264 art 1 s 6,33”; § 572B.07, “2010 c 264 art 1 s 7,33”; § 572B.21, “2010 c 264 art 1 s 21,33”; § 572B.23, “2010 c 264 art 1 s 23,33”; § 572B.25, “2010 c 264 art 1 s 25,33”; § 572B.28, “2010 c 264 art 1 s 28,33”; § 363A.31, “1984 c 567 s 1; 1985 c 175 s 1; 1Sp2021 c 11 art 3 s 16”; § 363A.33, which ends “2024 c 105 s 16-19”; and § 181.988, “2023 c 53 art 6 s 1.” The revisor’s table of Minnesota Statutes affected by the 2026 Regular Session was queried one exact section at a time for §§ 572B.03, 572B.04, 572B.06, 572B.07, 572B.21, 572B.23, 572B.25, 572B.28, 363A.28, 363A.31, 363A.33, and 181.988. None returned a 2026 Regular Session record, and none of the six records returned for § 363A.33 touches subdivision 7. The federal sections were retrieved from Cornell’s Legal Information Institute on September 8, 2026; § 2 carries a 2022 amendment credit to Pub. L. 117-90, and §§ 401 and 402 carry that Act as their only credit.

None of the three decisions cited here has been run through a citator. They were read in full from the Caselaw Access Project’s archives of 530 N.W.2d, 500 U.S., and 532 U.S., and each is reported for what it held on the date it was decided.

This page describes the machinery. Whether a particular clause covers a particular claim, when your dispute arose for purposes of 9 U.S.C. § 402, and what the arbitration provider’s own rules require are questions about your documents and your dates, and answering them is not what this page does.