September 2018 - Vol. 54, No. 9

Wonderful Article About Ida Wells; Consider a Statue of Her

Wonderful article about Ida Wells (“Ida B. Well: Fearless Journalist from Memphis Who Changed the World,” by David L. Hudson Jr., August 2018). As a postscript, Ms. Wells was “run out” of Memphis and her newspaper office burned to the ground, fueled by the racial hatred of Edward Ward Carmack, editor of the, then, Memphis Commercial. His paper demanded retaliation against “the black wench” for her denunciation of the lynchings.

One of the core objectives of the Tennessee Bar Association is advocacy for the profession and for our system of justice. The TBA Government Affairs Committee coordinates our advocacy efforts before the legislature, the executive branch and other governmental entities on issues of importance to our profession and on which the TBA has adopted policy.

Advising clients to plan ahead for who will make decisions on their behalf should they become incapacitated constitutes a significant component of elder law and estate planning. However, the customary legal path of appointing a substitute decision maker, while obviously required for many clients with diminished capacity, is certainly not a necessity for all such clients.

In the recent Tennessee Supreme Court opinion issued in June 2018, Coleman v. Olson, the court dealt with the issue of an alteration of the beneficiary of a life insurance policy during the pendency of a divorce. Family law practitioners should take note of this case as it provides the clearest guidance available when dealing with a similar issue going well beyond the mere statutory language in its analysis of such situations.

Knoxville lawyer PAUL EDWARD DUNN died on July 21. He was 87. A veteran of the U.S. Marine Corps, Dunn graduated from the University of Tennessee College of Law in 1961. Dunn practiced law in Knoxville for more than 40 years. He began practicing with renowned criminal defense lawyer Ray H. Jenkins and remained with the firm Jenkins and Jenkins until 1995, when he became a founding member of the firm Dunn, MacDonald and Coleman. He was named a Senior Counselor by the Tennessee Bar Association, and an honorary member of the Winfield Dunn cabinet.