Is a stipulation to arbitrate affecting a procedural right or remedy as opposed to an essential right of the client?

Turning to the question of whether a stipulation to arbitrate affected a procedural right or remedy as opposed to an essential right of the client, the court held: "[A]n attorney, merely by virtue of his employment as such, has no apparent authority to bind his client to an agreement for arbitration. We find no reason in logic, or policy, for holding his apparent authority in that respect is enlarged by reason of the fact that he has been retained to engage in litigation. When a client engages an attorney to litigate in a judicial forum, the client has a right to be consulted, and his consent obtained, before the dispute is shifted to another, and quite different, forum, particularly where the transfer entails the sort of substantial consequences present here." (Blanton v. Womancare, Inc., supra, 38 Cal.3d at pp. 407-408, 212 Cal.Rptr. 151, 696 P.2d 645.)