Introduction

The challenge in writing about hot topics in labor and employment law for the busy executive is to fairly describe the legal hazards in today's workplace without resorting to a footnote-laden legalistic summary of the law, as lawyers are prone to do. This is especially hard when one considers that labor and employment law presents a more fluid, complex, and challenging legal framework than perhaps any other area of the law.

Of the fifty titles in the United States Code, laws commonly applied to the employment relationship (in the private sector alone) can be found in at least ten titles, including one entirely devoted to "Labor," title 29. The laws most commonly associated with employment litigation, however--those statutes that make most types of discrimination in employment unlawful--are not even in title 29. Rather, the Civil Rights Act and the Americans with Disabilities Act are located in title 42--"Civil Rights." Moreover, the Railway Labor Act is in title 45--"Transportation," while the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act is in title 38--"Veterans." . . .

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