The TBA’s Court Square Series is headed to Gallatin on June 7. This three-hour program will provide attorneys with the latest developments in ethics, social security and elder law. Kick off the afternoon with a lunch and learn networking session with TBA leadership, followed by a legislative update from TBA Government Affairs Director Berkley Schwarz. Gallatin lawyer Chris George of George & George also will be on hand to provide a Social Security 101 primer. Programming will run from 11:30 a.m. until 3:15 p.m. CDT at Volunteer State Community College in the Mary Cole Nichols Dining Room B. Learn more and register here.

Those of us who went to law school used to know what a trust was, but in Tennessee we need to update our understanding. The traditional view says a “settlor” transfers assets to a “trustee,” who holds, invests, manages and distributes the assets for the benefit of, and owes fiduciary duties to, the “beneficiaries,” pursuant to the terms of the trust instrument. Eddy Smith untangles what a trust can actually mean under the Tennessee Trust Code in this issue's Where There's a Will column.

Anne-Louise Wirthlin is the director of Access to Justice in the Office of Access, Innovation, & Community Engagement of the Tennessee Supreme Court. She shares an update on what the ATJ Commission accomplished during 2022.

Tennessee has powerful statutes that can lift barriers for people with criminal charges. For many, these laws would essentially be meaningless without free legal resources. Judges, court clerks, public defenders, district attorneys and volunteer lawyers have stepped up to fill this access to justice gap. Joy Radice, director of the University of Tennessee Law Legal Clinic and a commissioner serving on the Tennessee Access to Justice Commission, explores the relief offered by the expungement statute, describes pro bono models that have been used statewide and highlights institutional expungement innovations.

TBA's annual Public Service Awards were presented April 15 at the Public Service Awards brunch, honoring three Tennesseans who are champions of legal aid and pro bono work.

To appreciate the advent and inclusion of the courts' modern Access to Justice feature, Russell Fowler writes that one must look at the whole concept of Rule of Law, and the keystone of that concept is it is a safeguard against the exercise of arbitrary power in its various forms.

Across the U.S., courts have begun to address landlord/tenant or eviction cases in a more systemic way. Linda Warren Seely, pro bono counsel at Butler Snow and vice chair of the TBA Access to Justice Committee, writes that while some reforms were underway pre-pandemic, the recent housing crisis is pushing innovations, including new partnerships and stakeholder engagement.

The need for free, civil legal services continues to grow at exponential rates. Laura Brown, executive director of Tennessee Alliance for Legal Services (TALS), shares about the work that Equal Justice Works Fellows Tomi Robb and Nick Gau are moving forward in housing and disaster resilience.

In her final Journal column, TBA President Tasha C. Blakney considers what the legal landscape would look like if there were no bar associations.

In the sixth and final installment of On the Road with TCB, the "Blakers" family pets are in the spotlight.