Labor Lawyer's Guide to the Rights and Responsibilities of Employee Whistleblowers

A complete overview of developments in statutory and common law that provide increased protection for whistleblowers and authorize punitive and compensatory damages in wrongful discharge actions. An overview of court decisions and the constitutional roots of whistleblower protection is included along with available legal remedies under both state and federal law. An extensive appendix lists texts of whistleblower protection laws.

Human Resource Management News

Beginning with an overview of the jurisprudential and constitutional roots of whistleblower protection, the authors go on to outline the numerous legal remedies under both state and federal law available to whistleblowers. They demonstrate that although no comprehensive federal whistleblower laws exist, many laws and doctrines are sufficiently interrelated to offer a safety net of protection. Turning their attention to the private sector, the authors explain state court developments concerning liberalization of the traditional employment at will doctrine. They then analyze the case law of the twenty-six states that have adopted a public policy exception to the doctrine and the new tort created by this exception which offers additional protection by permitting suits for damages by private sector whistleblowers. An extensive appendix lists the texts of thirty federal whistleblower protection laws, an expecially valuable feature for practicing labor law attorneys.

STEPHEN M. KOHN is a partner in the Washington, D.C., law firm of Kohn, Kohn & Colapinto, LLP, and Chairperson of the Board of Directors of the National Whistleblower Center. He is the former Director of Corporate Litigation for the Government Accountability Project. Nationally recognized for his scholarship and litigation on behalf of whistleblowers, Kohn in 1985 authored the first legal text on whistleblower law. He is the author of Concepts and Procedures in Whistleblower Law (Quorum, 2000).

MICHAEL D. KOHN served as articles editor to the Antioch Law Journal and has coauthored law review articles on labor law and civil liberties.