§ 171.026.Validity of Underlying Claim

A one-sentence rule that keeps the motion to compel from becoming a trial.

A court may not refuse to order arbitration because the claim lacks merit or bona fides.

Nor because the fault or ground for the claim is not shown. The two subdivisions cover the same instinct from different angles.

The instinct is a natural one. A judge reading a weak claim may see no reason to send anyone anywhere, and this section answers that.

The merits belong to the arbitrator. The parties contracted for someone else to decide whether the claim is any good, and a court that screened claims first would be taking back the bargain.

The court’s question under Section 171.021 is narrow: is there an agreement, and has the other side refused.

Section 171.090 states the same principle at the other end of the case. An award is not vacated because the relief granted could not have been granted by a court.

Together they mark the boundary of judicial review in this chapter — courts decide whether the parties agreed to arbitrate, and largely stay out of what the arbitrator does with the dispute.

The section does not protect an agreement that fails on its own terms. Section 171.022 still bars enforcing an unconscionable agreement, and Section 171.002 still puts some claims outside the chapter.