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1971-1972 Tennessee Attorney General Reports and Opinions 1 (1971-1972)

handle is hein.sag/sagtn0162 and id is 1 raw text is: OFFICE OF THE ATTORNEY GENERAL SUPREME COURT BUILDING NASHVILLE, TENNESSEE 37219 DAVID M. PACK ATTORNEY GENERAL & REPORTER OPINION NO. 1 DATE: June 9, 1971 TO: County Court Clerk QUESTION This Office has been requested to give an interpretation of Chapter 162 of the Public Acts of 1971. Said Act provides as follows: SECTION 1. This Act shall be known as and may be cited as the 'Legal Responsi- bility Act of 1971'. SECTION 2. Tennessee Code Annotated, Sections 23-1201, 28-107, 39-1003, 39-3706, and 57-123 is amended by deleting the word and number 'twenty-one (21)' wherever they appear in the sections and by substituting in lieu thereof the following word and number: 'eighteen (18)' SECTION 3. Notwithstanding any laws to the contrary, any person who is eighteen (18) years of age or older shall have the same rights, duties and responsibilities as a person who is twenty-one (21) years of age or older. SECTION 4. This Act shall take effect on becoming a law, the public welfare re- quiring it. OPINION It is my opinion that this Act lowers the age of majority from twenty-one to eighteen years. ANALYSIS At common law, the age at which an infant attained majority status was fixed at twenty- one years. U.S. v. Flowers, 227 Fed. Supp. 1014 (1963). The phrase majority is synonymous with coming of age or twenty-one; that is its legal meaning as accepted by common usage. Woodward v. Woodward, 87 Tenn. 644, 11 S.W. 892; Memphis Trust Company v. Blessing, 103 Tenn. 237, 58 S.W. 115. Until the passage of the Uniform Gift to Minors Act, there was no statute declaring the age of majority. With the passage of the Uniform Gift to Minors Act, a minor was defined to be a person who has not reached the age of twenty-one, and an adult was defined in said Act to be a person who has attained the age of twenty-one. T.C.A. 35-802. The rule is settled beyond doubt that majority or minority refers to status rather than a fixed or vested right, and that the Legislature has full power to fix and change the age of majority. This rule was recognized in this State in the case of Campbell v. Bon Air Coal & Iron Co., 268 S.W. 377, 151 Tenn. 132, wherein the Tennessee Supreme Court held that the Legislature has the power to fix the age at which the disability of infancy shall be removed. In the Camp- bell case, the Court was called upon to construe a statute whereby a minor was made sui juris for the purpose of employment. In affirming the Legislature's power to change the age of majority, the Court quoted with approval from Scott v. Nashville Bridge Co., 143 Tenn. 86, 223 S.W. 844, saying: However, we think there is no question as to the power of the Legislature to endow minors with the right to make contracts otherwise lawful, and after he has been so en- S dowed he becomes, for the purpose of the act, an adult, or at least, on the same plane. 151 Tenn. at 135. See also Tennessee Title Company v. Federal Savings and Loan, 185 Tenn. 145, 203 S.W.2d 697.

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