By:  Wentworth                                        S.B. No. 1381
                                 A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
                                        AN ACT
    1-1  relating to the validity of arbitration agreements.
    1-2        BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
    1-3        SECTION 1.  Article 224, revised statutes, is amended as
    1-4  follows:
    1-5        A written agreement to submit any existing controversy to
    1-6  arbitration or a provision in a written contract to submit to
    1-7  arbitration any controversy thereafter arising between the parties
    1-8  is valid, enforceable and irrevocable, save upon such grounds as
    1-9  exist at law or in the equity for the revocation of any contract.
   1-10  A court shall refuse to enforce an agreement or contract provision
   1-11  to submit a controversy to arbitration if the court finds it was
   1-12  unconscionable at the time the agreement or contract was made.
   1-13  Provided, however, that none of the provisions of this Act shall
   1-14  apply to:
   1-15        (a)  any collective bargaining agreement between an employer
   1-16  and a labor union;
   1-17        <(b)  any contract for the acquisition by an individual
   1-18  person or persons (as distinguished from a corporation, trust,
   1-19  partnership, association, or other legal entity) of real or
   1-20  personal property, or services, or money or credit where the total
   1-21  consideration therefor to be paid or furnished by the individual is
   1-22  $50,000 of less, unless said individual and the other party or
   1-23  parties agree in writing to submit to arbitration and such
    2-1  agreement is signed by the parties to such agreement and their
    2-2  attorneys;>
    2-3        (c)  any claim for personal injury except upon the advice of
    2-4  counsel to both parties as evidenced by a written agreement signed
    2-5  by counsel to both parties.  A claim for workers' compensation
    2-6  shall not be submitted to arbitration under this Act.
    2-7        SECTION 2.  The importance of this legislation and the
    2-8  crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
    2-9  emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
   2-10  constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
   2-11  days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended,
   2-12  and that this Act take effect and be in force from and after its
   2-13  passage, and it is so enacted.