Tattooed Officers and Departmental Image: A Content Analysis of Police Department Tattoo Policies in the United States

Police officers in the United States enjoy the same First Amendment rights as the general public, although courts have ruled repeatedly that those rights may be limited when they conflict with public trust. Police leaders seek to portray their officers positively, encourage professional appearances, and enact policies that seek to prevent extremist affiliations. This study used a qualitative document analysis approach to examine police departments’ publicly available policies, analyze the precision of policy language, identify exclusionary criteria that prohibit certain body art on officers, and determine whether policies are objective and enforceable or left to administrative discretion. The research investigates the changing culture around tattoos and whether police departments can suffer a decline in applicants if they refuse to update tattoo policies in the future, as well as the constitutional overreach departments might face if the policies are too strict and prohibit the rights of the individual officer. The study concludes with recommendations on how police departments can develop and implement fair policies as tattoos become more mainstream and no longer seen as taboo.