While doing some legal research in the National Enquirer on a recent weekend, I came across an article about phoney baloney lawyer John Edwards. He is facing trial in a federal district court for using vice-presidential campaign funds to conceal his extramarital affair with Rielle Hunter, mother of his child. The Enquirer reports that Edwards wants Hunter to marry him so she can refuse to take the witness stand.

When Breaking a Heart Is Breaking the Law

There was a time when a lady could judicially purchase balm for a wounded heart. That’s what happened in 1934 when Evelyn Montgomery Hazen obtained an $80,000 judgment against louse Ralph Porter Scharringhaus for breach of promise to marry. See “Paine on Procedure” in the February 2007 Tennessee Bar Journal. What has happened since 1934 to the heartbalm causes of action in Tennessee?

By Bob Cowser Jr. | University of New Orleans Publishing | $15.95 | 178 pages | 2009

Four decades passed between the execution of William James Tines and Robert Glen Coe on April 19, 2000. This book details the crime and trial that culminated in Coe’s death by lethal injection.

Greenfield is a small town in the southwest corner of Weakley County. It was there that Robert Coe, age 23, kidnapped, raped and murdered

What may be the most important procedure in civil or criminal practice is not written in the rules. It occurs at the outset of litigation during the initial client interview. The procedural principle is simple: listen to the client!

Have you ever encountered a member of our sister profession — medicine — who insisted on talking rather than listening? Dr. Jerome Groopman in How Doctors Think admonishes his colleagues to shut up and listen. Fortunately my medical team listens to their patient.

Let’s start with the 1965 rule making statutes codified at Tenn. Code Ann. §§16-3-402 through 407. They were enacted in anticipation of the Tennessee Rules of Civil Procedure, which were then being drafted and became effective Jan. 1, 1971. Section 406 states: “After the [Supreme Court] rules have become effective, all laws in conflict with the rules shall be of no further force or effect.” It is noteworthy that no Code section provides for nullification of a Supreme Court rule by subsequent legislation on the same subject.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau wrote that a “great princess” was heard to say about the hungry French peasants: “Let them eat cake.” Through the ages to the present day folks have taken as truth that Marie Antionette was the declarant.

But she never said it. She was notable for her compassion toward the masses. The legend is utterly false. See Antonia Fraser’s Marie Antionette (2001) at page 124 and Ann Coulter’s Demonic (2011) at page 104.

By Ed Bryant | Main Street Publishing Inc. | $23 | 188 pages | 2011

We need to preserve Tennessee legal history. U.S. Magistrate Judge Ed Bryant of Jackson helped that effort in this book. Presiding on the cover are District Court judges James D. Todd and J. Daniel Breen (Tennessee Bar Association president 1996-1997). In the background with a dog is District Judge “Will” Ross, who died in a car wreck one day after his indictment for forgery and fraud. Finally, there’s Sixth Circuit Judge (and later Supreme Court Justice) Howell Jackson advertising a cigar.

A client walks into my office with a serious personal injury case. She was hurt in a car wreck 11 months ago, spent a week in the hospital, and continues to undergo therapy. From experience I figure a jury would return a verdict in the neighborhood of $250,000.

I immediately file a civil warrant for $25,000 in General Sessions Court.

The judge finds the defendant 100 percent at fault and awards my client the Sessions damage cap of $25,000.

Answer this question on procedure and constitutional law: Can a citizen simultaneously serve on the Tennessee Supreme Court and in the United States Congress? Because this is an open book exam, you may consult Tenn. Const. art. VI §7 and Tenn. Code Ann. §8-18-101(7).

Our current Constitution repeats the language of the 1834 version verbatim: “The Judges of the Supreme Court … shall not … hold any other office of trust or profit under … the United States.” The Code likewise disqualifies from state office members of Congress. So the answer to my question is “no.”

We are all creatures of habit. Evidence Rule 406 admits habit as relevant to prove conforming conduct.