Gorsuch stressed in his dissent in Ragab that he does not “believe conflicting contract provisions might never render an arbitration agreement void for lack of a meeting of the minds.” In Genberg v. Porter, in 2014, Gorsuch wrote a panel opinion imposing just such an outcome, ruling that the defendants, members of the board of a company from which the plaintiff had been fired, were not bound by the arbitration agreement because they had not signed it. One of the two other arbitration cases in which he wrote focuses on the importance of determining whether an arbitration agreement is valid. In Howard v. Ferrellgas Partners LLP, in 2014, Gorsuch wrote for the panel reversing a district court denial of a motion to compel arbitration. He wrote that rather than deny a motion for arbitration because of a factual dispute about the agreement, the district court was required to move quickly to resolve the dispute. According to Gorsuch, “before the Act’s heavy hand in favor of arbitration swings into play, the parties themselves must agree to have their disputes arbitrated. While Congress has chosen to preempt state laws that aim to channel disputes into litigation rather than arbitration, even under the FAA it remains a ‘fundamental principle’ that ‘arbitration is a matter of contract,’ not something to be foisted on the parties at all costs.”

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