In a recent case, the Court of Appeals of Tennessee was asked by a terminated employee (“Employee”) to rule that an agreement to arbitrate in his employment contract (Employment Agreement”) was not enforceable because arbitration would be too expensive. The court disagreed with the Employee, and affirmed the order of…
In Tennessee, contracts may be modified after they are made and after the parties have begun performing. In fact, it happens all of the time. Tennessee law allows the modification of contracts, and a modified contract is as effective as the original contract. Many Tennessee breach of contract cases result…
Tennessee follows the “American Rule” which holds that the losing party in a lawsuit is not required to pay the attorney’s fees of the wining party. There are exceptions to the American Rule which come up quite often in Tennessee cases. First, if a statute provides that the prevailing party…
In a breach of contract case involving a subcontractor’s claim against a general contractor, Skelton v. Freese Const. Co., Inc., the Court of Appeals of Tennessee recently ruled that the general contractor did not waive its right to require that the case be arbitrated, and reversed the trial court on…
Parties in negotiations sometimes make offers and counter-offers, but do not specify by when their offers must be accepted by the other party. When that happens, one party might accept an outstanding offer and then be told by the other party that the acceptance was too late to be effective.…
Whether you are involved with a breach of contract case, will dispute case, real estate case or any type of commercial litigation case in a Tennessee court, you can help yourself by knowing a little about the basic rules of evidence that apply in Tennessee state court cases. In my…
In Tennessee breach of contract cases, the defense of unilateral mistake falls in the category of legal defenses (and claims) that are fairly often asserted, but rarely successful. Nevertheless, for lawyers who handle breach of contract cases in Tennessee, this is a defense that, in some cases, can be outcome…
Tennessee recognizes both a statutory and a common law cause of action for intentional interference with contract, also sometimes called procurement of breach of contract or tortious interference with contract. The statutory cause of action is found at Tenn. Code Ann. §47-50-109. To say that the public policy of Tennessee…
There are many situations in which Tennessee courts have been able to impose resulting trusts to recover property for aggrieved parties when no other legal avenue was available to help. The law of resulting trusts, to boil it down to the point of over generalization, allows a court “to follow…
In Nashville, as well as all other Tennessee cities and counties, there is plenty of land— commercial, residential, rural, and urban— that is owned by more than one person as tenants in common, also sometimes referred to as “co-tenants.” There can be two tenants in common or more, to a…