Tennessee State Board of Education
Guidance – Recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance
GUIDANCE SECTIONS
1. Pledge of Allegiance
2. Appropriate Etiquette and Display of the Flag
Public education supports various community functions, including provision for a responsible citizenry.
The United States Supreme Court has recognized that public schools are “vitally important in the
preparation of individuals for participation as citizens, and as vehicles for inculcating fundamental values
necessary to the maintenance of a democratic political system.”1 As such, local school boards and their
administrative and educational employees can play a key role in transmitting and instilling the knowledge
and values of our society into the lives of our young citizens of Tennessee. T.C.A. § 49-6-1001 sets forth
certain requirements regarding the Pledge of Allegiance and display of the American flag and requires
the State Board of Education, in consultation with the Office of the Attorney General, to develop
guidelines on constitutional rights and restrictions relating to the recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance in
public schools.2
1. Pledge of Allegiance
(a) Each local board of education shall require the daily recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance
in each classroom in the school system in which a flag is displayed.
(b) At the time designated by the local school board, students should stand and recite the
Pledge of Allegiance while facing the flag with their right hands over their hearts or in an
appropriate salute if in uniform.
(c) No student shall be compelled to recite the Pledge of Allegiance if the student or the
student’s parent or legal guardian objects on religious, philosophical, or other grounds to
the student participating in such exercise. The school or local board of education shall
exempt the student from participation.
(d) Students who are exempt from reciting the Pledge of Allegiance shall remain quietly
standing or sitting at their desks while others recite the Pledge of Allegiance and shall
make no display that disrupts or distracts others who are reciting the Pledge.
(e) The local board of education’s code of conduct shall apply to disruptive behavior during
the recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance in the same manner as provided for other
circumstances of such behavior.
(f) Teachers and other school staff who have religious, philosophical, or other grounds for
objecting to saying or leading the Pledge of Allegiance are exempt from leading or
participating in the exercise.
1 Bd. of Educ., Island Trees Union Free School Dist. No. 26 v. Pico, 457 U.S. 853, 864 (1982).
2 Schools have clear authority to require that non-participating stu dents refrain from any activity that disrupts or distracts those
making the Pledge. Goetz v. Ans ell, 477 F.2d 636, 638 (2nd Cir. 1973).
