Terms Used In Tennessee Code > Title 10 > Chapter 7 > Part 3 - Public Records Commission

• Agency: means any department, division, board, bureau, commission, or other separate unit of government created by law or pursuant to law, including the legislative branch and the judicial branch. See Tennessee Code 10-7-301
• Appeal: A request made after a trial, asking another court (usually the court of appeals) to decide whether the trial was conducted properly. To make such a request is "to appeal" or "to take an appeal." One who appeals is called the appellant.
• Arraignment: A proceeding in which an individual who is accused of committing a crime is brought into court, told of the charges, and asked to plead guilty or not guilty.
• Defendant: In a civil suit, the person complained against; in a criminal case, the person accused of the crime.
• Disposition: means preservation of the original records in whole or in part, preservation by photographic or other reproduction processes, or outright destruction of the records. See Tennessee Code 10-7-301
• division: means the division of records management of the department of state. See Tennessee Code 10-7-301
• Essential records: means any public records essential to the resumption or continuation of operations, to the re-creation of the legal and financial status of government in the state or to the protection and fulfillment of obligations to citizens of the state. See Tennessee Code 10-7-301
• Jurisdiction: (1) The legal authority of a court to hear and decide a case. Concurrent jurisdiction exists when two courts have simultaneous responsibility for the same case. (2) The geographic area over which the court has authority to decide cases.
• Juror: A person who is on the jury.
• Lands: includes lands, tenements and hereditaments, and all rights thereto and interests therein, equitable as well as legal. See Tennessee Code 1-3-105
• Oath: A promise to tell the truth.
• Oath: includes affirmation. See Tennessee Code 1-3-105
• Person: includes a corporation, firm, company or association. See Tennessee Code 1-3-105
• 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
• Records disposition authorization: means the official document utilized by an agency head to request authority for the disposition of records. See Tennessee Code 10-7-301
• Records management: includes records retention schedule development, essential records protection, files management and information retrieval systems, microfilm information systems, correspondence and word processing management, records center, forms management, analysis, and design, and reports and publications management. See Tennessee Code 10-7-301
• Records officer: means an individual designated by an agency head to assume responsibility for implementation of the agency's records management program. See Tennessee Code 10-7-301
• Reporter: Makes a record of court proceedings and prepares a transcript, and also publishes the court's opinions or decisions (in the courts of appeals).
• 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
• 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.
• Temporary records: means material which can be disposed of in a short period of time as being without value in documenting the functions of an agency. See Tennessee Code 10-7-301
• Trial: A hearing that takes place when the defendant pleads "not guilty" and witnesses are required to come to court to give evidence.
• United States: includes the District of Columbia and the several territories of the United States. See Tennessee Code 1-3-105
• Working papers: means those records created to serve as input for final reporting documents, including electronic data processed records, and/or computer output microfilm, and those records which become obsolete immediately after agency use or publication. See Tennessee Code 10-7-301
• written: includes printing, typewriting, engraving, lithography, and any other mode of representing words and letters. See Tennessee Code 1-3-105