Public Policy Exceptions
Under the public policy exception, an employer may not fire an employee if it would violate the state's public policy doctrine or a state or federal statute.
This includes retaliating against an employee for performing an action that complies with public policy (such as informing the authorities of an illegal activity, for instance abuse of a resident in a nursing home), as well as refusing to perform an action that would violate public policy. In this diagram, the pink states have the 'exception', which protects the employee.
As of October 2000, forty-three U.S. states and the District of Columbia recognize public policy as an exception to the at-will rule.
The 7 states which do not have the exception are:
- Alabama
- Georgia
- Louisiana
- Maine
- Nebraska
- New York
- Rhode Island
- Florida – three limited conditions can override an at-will agreement
Read more about this topic: At-will Employment
Famous quotes containing the words public, policy and/or exceptions:
“I have found it; I have discovered the cause of all the misfortunes which befell him. A public school, Joseph, was the cause of all the calamaties which he afterwards suffered. Public schools are the nurseries of all vice and immorality.”
—Henry Fielding (1707–1754)
“Mr. Wiggam, I want you to change the policy of The Clarion. I want you to write a story I should have written myself long ago. I want you to tell the people of San Francisco that no city can exist without law and order. Write a story about that flag, write about what verifies and brings a promise of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. There are some people in this town who don’t seem to know that. Let The Clarion tell them.”
—Ben Hecht (1893–1964)
“Skepticism is unbelief in cause and effect. A man does not see, that, as he eats, so he thinks: as he deals, so he is, and so he appears; he does not see that his son is the son of his thoughts and of his actions; that fortunes are not exceptions but fruits; that relation and connection are not somewhere and sometimes, but everywhere and always; no miscellany, no exemption, no anomaly,—but method, and an even web; and what comes out, that was put in.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)