This case concerns an employee's claim for unemployment benefits under the Tennessee Employment Security Act after she refused her employer's offer to transfer from day-shift work to a 4:00 p.m. to midnight shift. The Board of Review and chancellor found the work unsuitable due to the claimant's domestic circumstances (three children aged 12-15 and a husband who worked nights) and awarded benefits, but the Tennessee Supreme Court reversed. The court held that the facts were undisputed and that the claimant had made herself unavailable for work by limiting her availability based on personal schedule preferences, rendering the offered work suitable under the statute. It applied precedents such as Moore v. Commissioner of Employment Security, concluding that a claimant who refuses suitable work without good cause connected to the employment is disqualified from benefits.
The case involved George Peabody College for Teachers appealing a decision by the State Board of Equalization that its apartments and dwellings for married students and their families were subject to ad valorem taxes for 1964. The Chancery Court upheld the Board's ruling based on prior precedent interpreting T.C.A. sec. 67-502(2). The Supreme Court of Tennessee reversed, holding that the properties were exempt because the housing facilities were directly incidental to and an integral part of the college's educational purpose. The court reasoned that providing such housing for married students and families, like other student facilities such as dining areas, qualifies for the statutory exemption for educational institutions under the Tennessee Constitution.
This case involved a wrongful death claim by the administrator of William Holder's estate against a funeral home and its ambulance driver for alleged negligence in a second car accident that occurred while transporting Holder after an initial collision with a police car; the plaintiff had settled with the town and police officer from the first accident via a covenant not to sue. The defendants raised defenses of accord and satisfaction and election of remedies based on that settlement. The trial court instructed the jury on those defenses, treating the parties as potential joint tortfeasors, but the Tennessee Supreme Court held the instructions erroneous because the two accidents were independent and the settlement with one set of parties did not discharge liability for the other. The court reversed the judgments of the Court of Appeals and trial court, finding the error was prejudicial, and remanded for further proceedings under proper instructions.
This case involved a dispute over the applicable statute of limitations in a suit by insured parties against their automobile insurer for injuries from a 1964 hit-and-run accident under the policy's Uninsured Motorist Coverage clause. The trial court sustained a demurrer, ruling that the one-year tort statute barred the action filed in 1965, but the Tennessee Supreme Court reversed on appeal. The court held that the six-year contract statute of limitations applies because the claim arises from the direct contractual relationship between the insured and insurer, under which the insurer agrees to pay sums the insured is legally entitled to recover from an uninsured motorist, rather than from any tort committed by the insurer itself. The opinion emphasized that the insurer's liability stems solely from the policy terms, not from tortious conduct, and distinguished precedents involving suretyship or malpractice claims where the gravamen was tortious injury.
The case concerned whether a second permittee, who borrowed a car from the son of the named insured, had implied permission to use the vehicle under the omnibus clause of an automobile insurance policy, entitling a passenger injured in an accident to medical payments coverage. The court held that the second permittee did not have such permission, as the named insured had no knowledge of others using the car and had not given unrestricted permission that would imply allowance for lending the vehicle. The reasoning relied on prior precedents requiring evidence of express or implied permission through course of conduct, and distinguished the medical payments coverage from financial responsibility laws which do not alter the permission requirement here.
This case involved the convictions of Ed Alley and Eugene Stamey for professional gambling and related offenses stemming from a police raid on Stamey's home where officers observed signs of a craps game. The court reversed Alley's professional gambling conviction, finding insufficient evidence that his gambling was professional rather than recreational, but affirmed Stamey's convictions and the misdemeanor charges against both. The court upheld the warrantless arrest and search as lawful because the officers had observed the gambling activity in progress, providing reasonable grounds for believing a crime was being committed in their presence, making the evidence admissible.