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June 6th, 2010 
James PetersYesterday I came across an article about an “English-only” law Tennessee passed just last week. My first reaction was similar to when I first heard of the Arizona immigration law, which is that it clearly violates federal law, will be struck down by the courts in short order, and is really nothing more than a political ploy to seem tough on immigration policy.
Most past legislation along these lines has tried to either require English-only in places of employment or allowed employers to require their employees to speak English. Conservative California legislators made a half-hearted attempt at passing such a law a few years ago without gaining much traction.
As we have pointed out in the past, such laws are invalid because they violate Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, which specifically prohibits such policies unless there is an actual “business necessity” for them. For example, a nurse could be required to speak only English to a doctor during surgery. However, upon further examination I discovered that the Tennessee bill does not even try to defy federal law.
The Tennessee bill is an example of the worst kind of law: one that has no valid purpose except to pick on a minority group. All the law does is restate the Title VII language that allows such a policy only where there is a “business or safe workplace necessity” for it.
The law waters down its language even further by stating that an employer cannot require English-only when an employee is on a break or talking to co-workers. Essentially, the law can be re-stated as follows: “Employers can require an employee to speak English, but only if it is necessary for them to do so”.
In short, all the Tennessee law does is restate federal law, but in a deceptive way. Instead of saying that English-only policies are illegal except where justified by business necessity, it purports to give employers permission (or even encourage them) to create such policies if necessary, which likely is not a problem to begin with and employers are already free to do under federal law.
All states in this country are in the middle of a fiscal crisis that is putting their legislatures’ budgetary skills to the test. There are not enough hours in the day for most of them to come up with solutions to their states’ most pressing problems. However, Tennessee’s legislature apparently decided that writing and passing a law that has no legal affect on anyone whatsoever, but instead tries to ostracize those who either do not speak English or have difficulty doing so. That is just mean.
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Keep all of the Illegals in your state then and see how well you do ! All of the idiots that come here and decide to keep speaking their native tounges, you house them all and be happy then !
The bill is not mean spirited... I actually followed the links to the bill itself and it says that they are only required to speak english in instances that it is required to get required work accomplished or when it poses an unsafe work environment to not speak english. It is perfectly reasonable. It also says that if the job does not require english to be spoken the person can have an interpreter with them during the interview process.
I do see what you are saying, but legally that is not what the law says. The law allows the requirement where there is a "business or safe workplace necessity". This is defined as:
(1) For communications with customers, coworkers, or supervisors who speak English, and
(2) In emergencies or other situations in which workers must speak a common language to promote and ensure safety
The law does not say it is allowed only where communication in English is necessary, just where the employer "requires" it. For example, where a customer speaks both Spanish and English, the employee would be required to speak to them in English (even if they both speak Spanish). The law does not say that it is only allowed where a customer, coworker or supervisor only speaks English.
Also, an employer in virtually any setting can argue that the mere possibility of an emergency at some point in the future requires everyone to speak English.
If the law were written as you interpret it, then I would probably agree with you. However, lawyers tend to run with the language and interpret it as it's written, not as it was "meant" to be.