Chapter 3 - § 3.4 • COLORADO REVISED UNIFORM ARBITRATION ACT (CRUAA)

• Jurisdiction: Colorado

§ 3.4 • COLORADO REVISED UNIFORM ARBITRATION ACT (CRUAA)

The Colorado Revised Uniform Arbitration Act (CRUAA), C.R.S. §§ 13-22-201, et seq. (2016), was adopted in 2004, and applies to arbitration agreements in Colorado entered into after August 4, 2004, except to the extent preempted in part by the FAA. The CRUAA also applies to earlier agreements to arbitrate if the parties so agree.¹⁹ Thus, this Act is gradually replacing the Colorado Uniform Arbitration Act (CUAA).

However, whether the CUAA or CRUAA, adopted in 2004, applies to arbitration agreements entered into prior to August 4, 2004, was discussed but not clarified by the Colorado Supreme Court in Lane v. Urgitus.²⁰ It might be implied that some provisions of the CRUAA will be applied to arbitrations under arbitration agreements entered into prior to August 4, 2004, particularly procedural provisions.

The CRUAA and the CUAA have the same statutory numbering system. Hence, when citing to either of them, it must be explicitly stated whether the citation is to the CRUAA or the CUAA. The 2004 and subsequent editions of the Colorado Revised Statutes contain only the CRUAA, although many arbitrations occurring thereafter have been and will be governed by the CUAA. In this book, when the statutory citation is followed by "(2004)," that means that the citation is to the CUAA; if the citation is followed by "(2016)," the citation is to the CRUAA.

Of course, it is conceivable that a case might arise in Colorado over which state law governs, but under Colorado's choice-of-law rules or the parties' choice-of-law agreement, the substantive arbitration law of another state might apply.²¹ However, unless the parties validly selected the law of a particular state, an arbitration having such an interstate nature probably would mean federal law (FAA) would apply. Applying the concept enunciated in Erie Railroad v. Tompkins²² that only state substantive law and not procedural law is applicable to a federal court whose jurisdiction is based on diversity of citizenship, presumably only the substantive arbitration law of that non-forum state would be applicable. See Chapter 4 of this book. Many of the arbitration statutes are procedural in nature, and the Colorado courts probably would apply Colorado's procedural arbitration law even if applying the substantive arbitration law of another jurisdiction.

It should be noted that both the CRUAA and CUAA are Uniform Acts (adopted by Colorado with slight modifications). Both of...