Terms Used In Tennessee Code > Title 4 > Chapter 21 > Part 1 - General Provisions

• Amendment: A proposal to alter the text of a pending bill or other measure by striking out some of it, by inserting new language, or both. Before an amendment becomes part of the measure, thelegislature must agree to it.
• Bankruptcy: Refers to statutes and judicial proceedings involving persons or businesses that cannot pay their debts and seek the assistance of the court in getting a fresh start. Under the protection of the bankruptcy court, debtors may discharge their debts, perhaps by paying a portion of each debt. Bankruptcy judges preside over these proceedings.
• Board: means the board of assessment commissioners. See Tennessee Code 7-84-103
• Commission: means the Tennessee human rights commission. See Tennessee Code 4-21-102
• Contract: A legal written agreement that becomes binding when signed.
• County official: means a county clerk, a clerk of a circuit court, a criminal court, or a probate court, a clerk and master of a chancery court, a clerk of a general sessions court where such general sessions court has an independent clerk who serves such court only, a register of deeds, a county trustee, a sheriff, a county road superintendent elected by a county legislative body, by a county road commission or commissioners, or by popular vote, and an assessor of property, any county commissioner elected by popular vote, serving in a county having a county commission form of government. See Tennessee Code 8-34-101
• District: means the central business district created by ordinance or resolution by a municipality, or a corridor of central business districts created by joint agreement of two (2) or more municipalities. See Tennessee Code 7-84-103
• Employer: means the state, or any political or civil subdivision thereof, and persons employing eight (8) or more persons within the state, or any person acting as an agent of an employer, directly or indirectly. See Tennessee Code 4-21-102
• Establishment ordinance: means the ordinance of the governing body adopted pursuant to §. See Tennessee Code 7-84-503
• Familial status: means one (1) or more individuals, who have not attained eighteen (18) years of age, being domiciled with:
  (A) A parent or another person having legal custody of such individual or individuals. See Tennessee Code 4-21-102
• Governing body: means the council, commission, board or other body exercising general legislative power in the municipality. See Tennessee Code 7-84-503
• Lands: includes lands, tenements and hereditaments, and all rights thereto and interests therein, equitable as well as legal. See Tennessee Code 1-3-105
• Lease: A contract transferring the use of property or occupancy of land, space, structures, or equipment in consideration of a payment (e.g., rent). ^{Source: OCC}
• Metropolitan government: means the political entity created by consolidation of all, or substantially all, of the political and corporate functions of a county and a city or cities. See Tennessee Code 7-1-101
• Mortgage: The written agreement pledging property to a creditor as collateral for a loan.
• Municipality: means any incorporated city, town or metropolitan government of this state exercising general governmental functions in the state. See Tennessee Code 7-84-503
• National origin: includes the national origin of an ancestor. See Tennessee Code 4-21-102
• Owner: means record owner in fee, or a duly authorized representative. See Tennessee Code 7-84-503
• Person: includes one (1) or more individuals, governments, governmental agencies, public authorities, labor organizations, corporations, legal representatives, partnerships, associations, trustees, trustees in bankruptcy, receivers, mutual companies, joint stock companies, trusts, unincorporated organizations or other organized groups of persons. See Tennessee Code 4-21-102
• Probate: Proving a will
• Property: includes both personal and real property. See Tennessee Code 1-3-105
• Real property: includes buildings, structures, real estate, lands, tenements, leaseholds, cooperatives, condominiums, and hereditaments, corporeal and incorporeal, or any interest in these. See Tennessee Code 4-21-102
• Real property: Land, and all immovable fixtures erected on, growing on, or affixed to the land.
• Record: means information that is inscribed on a tangible medium or that is stored in an electronic or other medium and is retrievable in a perceivable form. See Tennessee Code 1-3-105
• Representative: when applied to those who represent a decedent, includes executors and administrators, unless the context implies heirs and distributees. See Tennessee Code 1-3-105
• Sex: means and refers only to the designation of an individual person as male or female as indicated on the individual's birth certificate. See Tennessee Code 4-21-102
• State: when applied to the different parts of the United States, includes the District of Columbia and the several territories of the United States. See Tennessee Code 1-3-105
• Statute: A law passed by a legislature.
• written: includes printing, typewriting, engraving, lithography, and any other mode of representing words and letters. See Tennessee Code 1-3-105