532
Opinion of the Court
tion clause was unenforceable under the FAA both because it was a contract of adhesion and because it violated COGSA § 3(8). The premise of the latter argument was that the inconvenience and costs of proceeding in Japan would "lesse[n] . . . liability" as those terms are used in COGSA.
The District Court rejected the adhesion argument, observing that Congress defined the arbitration agreements enforceable under the FAA to include maritime bills of lading, 9 U. S. C. § 1, and that petitioner was a sophisticated party familiar with the negotiation of maritime shipping transactions. It also rejected the argument that requiring the parties to submit to arbitration would lessen respondents' liability under COGSA § 3(8). The court granted the motion to stay judicial proceedings and to compel arbitration; it retained jurisdiction pending arbitration; and at petitioner's request, it certified for interlocutory appeal under 28 U. S. C. § 1292(b) its ruling to compel arbitration, stating that the controlling question of law was "whether [COGSA § 3(8)] nullifies an arbitration clause contained in a bill of lading governed by COGSA." Pet. for Cert. 30a.
The First Circuit affirmed the order to arbitrate. 29 F. 3d 727 (1994). Although it expressed grave doubt whether a foreign arbitration clause lessened liability under COGSA § 3(8), id., at 730, the Court of Appeals assumed the clause was invalid under COGSA and resolved the conflict between the statutes in favor of the FAA, which it considered to be the later enacted and more specific statute, id., at 731-733. We granted certiorari, 513 U. S. 1013 (1995), to resolve a Circuit split on the enforceability of foreign arbitration clauses in maritime bills of lading. Compare the case below (enforcing foreign arbitration clause assuming arguendo it violated COGSA), with State Establishment for Agricultural Product Trading v. M/V Wesermunde, 838 F. 2d 1576 (CA11) (declining to enforce foreign arbitration clause because that would violate COGSA), cert. denied, 488 U. S. 916 (1988). We now affirm.
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