Cite as: 532 U. S. 411 (2001)
Opinion of the Court
The Tribe also asserts that a form contract, designed principally for private parties who have no immunity to waive, cannot establish a clear waiver of tribal suit immunity. Brief for Respondent 20; Tr. of Oral Arg. 27-28. In appropriate cases, we apply "the common-law rule of contract interpretation that a court should construe ambiguous language against the interest of the party that drafted it." Mastrobuono v. Shearson Lehman Hutton, Inc., 514 U. S. 52, 62 (1995) (construing form contract containing arbitration clause). That rule, however, is inapposite here. The contract, as we have explained, is not ambiguous. Nor did the Tribe find itself holding the short end of an adhesion contract stick: The Tribe proposed and prepared the contract; C & L foisted no form on a quiescent Tribe. Cf. United States v. Bankers Ins. Co., 245 F. 3d 315, 319-320 (CA4 2001) (where federal agency prepared agreement, including its arbitration provision, sovereign immunity does not shield the agency from engaging in the arbitration process).6
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For the reasons stated, we conclude that under the agreement the Tribe proposed and signed, the Tribe clearly consented to arbitration and to the enforcement of arbitral awards in Oklahoma state court; the Tribe thereby waived its sovereign immunity from C & L's suit. The judgment of the Oklahoma Court of Civil Appeals is therefore reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
6 The Tribe alternatively urges affirmance on the grounds that the contract is void under 25 U. S. C. § 81 and that the members of the Tribe who executed the contract lacked the authority to do so on the Tribe's behalf. These issues were not aired in the Oklahoma courts and are not within the scope of the questions on which we granted review. We therefore decline to address them.
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