The TBA Celebrates Pro Bono IOLTA Turns 25 in Tennessee

Twenty-five years ago, Emmett Marston of Memphis was the Tennessee Bar Association president — the same year the Tennessee Supreme Court entered the order sustaining the petition of the Tennessee Bar Association (TBA) and the Tennessee Bar Foundation (TBF) “for this Court to authorize the establishment and implementation of a program for the utilization for legal charitable purposes within the State of Tennessee of interest derived from

‘Twombly’ article very helpful

This letter was sent to Andrée S. Blumstein, who wrote the referenced article.

Thank you — again! Your article in the July Tennessee Bar Journal, “Twombly Gets IQBAL-ED” was another excellent example of your helpful analysis in this evolving procedural issue. It is of great interest to those of us who still call ourselves “trial lawyers.”

I must confess that the constantly changing nuances surrounding the determination of Rule 12 Motions to Dismiss make

TBAConnect

New Web Site Connects You to Other Lawyers

It’s like Facebook but without your high school friends popping up — and no ads for botox or wrinkle cream!
The Tennessee Bar Association has launched a new social networking platform for members — called TBAConnect. This service provides many of the same features of mainstream sites such as Linked In or Facebook, but access is limited to members of the Tennessee Bar Association and approved guests. Already members are using TBAConnect to

Reinstated

Pamela L. Reeves, of the Knoxville law firm Reeves, Herbert & Murrian PA, was recently installed as president of the American College of Civil Trial Mediators, an association of 150 dispute resolution professionals from across the country. Reeves, who was the first female president of the Tennessee Bar Association in 1998, is now the first woman to serve as president of the college.

The Nashville law firm of Williams & Prochaska PC has named Victoria A. Ferraro as a partner in the firm. Ferraro,
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FINANCIAL REGULATORY REFORM

Obama Administration Proposal to Rebuild Financial Supervision and Regulation

The Obama Administration has proposed radical changes in the ways banks and other financial companies are regulated. While at this writing, none of these proposals has been implemented, it is instructive
to examine the outline of the Department of Treasury’s “new foundation.”

The plan proposes to meet these five key objectives:

• Promote robust supervision and regulation of financial firms;
• E
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The Federal Residual Hearsay Exception

The birthplace of this evidentiary nonsense was Selma in Dallas County, Ala. On Sunday, July 7, 1957, the clock tower of the courthouse fell into the courtroom. A newspaper article published in 1901 reported a courthouse fire during construction. In Dallas County v. Commercial Union Assurance Company Ltd., 286 F.2d 388 (1961), the
Fifth Circuit held the article admissible hearsay even though it fit no hearsay exception of that era. (Probably the article woul

Ricci v. DeStefano Holds Statistical Disparities Cannot Justify Race-Based Employment Decisions

Where There’s Smoke but No Fire

The publicity following the Supreme Court’s decision in Ricci v. DeStefano,[1] can be attributed to the then-pending nomination of Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court. The publicity tends to overshadow the actual holding in Ricci, which is not easy to grasp even without the hype. This article addresses the holding in Ricci and explains the practical impact it will h

The Trial of Atticus

Next year marks the 50th anniversary of the publication of Harper Lee’s Pulitzer Prize-winning masterpiece, To Kill a Mockingbird, and the 48th anniversary of the film based on the novel, featuring an Academy Award-winning performance by Gregory Peck as Atticus Finch. If you ask a lawyer to name his or her all-time favorite novel, the odds are overwhelming that he or she will quickly reply, “To Kill a Mockingbird.” And if you ask that same lawyer to name his or her all-