Cite as: 514 U. S. 938 (1995)
Opinion of the Court
We believe the answer to the "who" question (i. e., the standard-of-review question) is fairly simple. Just as the arbitrability of the merits of a dispute depends upon whether the parties agreed to arbitrate that dispute, see, e. g., Mastrobuono v. Shearson Lehman Hutton, Inc., ante, at 57; Mitsubishi Motors Corp. v. Soler Chrysler-Plymouth, Inc., 473 U. S. 614, 626 (1985), so the question "who has the primary power to decide arbitrability" turns upon what the parties agreed about that matter. Did the parties agree to submit the arbitrability question itself to arbitration? If so, then the court's standard for reviewing the arbitrator's decision about that matter should not differ from the standard courts apply when they review any other matter that parties have agreed to arbitrate. See AT&T Technologies, Inc. v. Communications Workers, 475 U. S. 643, 649 (1986) (parties may agree to arbitrate arbitrability); Steelworkers v. Warrior & Gulf Nav. Co., 363 U. S. 574, 583, n. 7 (1960) (same). That is to say, the court should give considerable leeway to the arbitrator, setting aside his or her decision only in certain narrow circumstances. See, e. g., 9 U. S. C. § 10. If, on the other hand, the parties did not agree to submit the arbitrability question itself to arbitration, then the court should decide that question just as it would decide any other question that the parties did not submit to arbitration, namely, independently. These two answers flow inexorably from the fact that arbitration is simply a matter of contract between the parties; it is a way to resolve those disputes—but only those disputes—that the parties have agreed to submit to arbitration. See, e. g., AT&T Technologies, supra, at 649; Mastrobuono, ante, at 57-58, and n. 9; Allied-Bruce Terminix Cos. v. Dobson, 513 U. S. 265, 271 (1995); Mitsubishi Motors Corp., supra, at 625-626.
We agree with First Options, therefore, that a court must defer to an arbitrator's arbitrability decision when the parties submitted that matter to arbitration. Nevertheless,
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