LF: Tennessee Court Says Music City Can Keep Cracking Down on Home Recording Studios

Music City can continue its crackdown on home music studios thanks to a new ruling from the Davidson County Chancery Court in Tennessee upholding a Nashville law that prohibits home business owners from serving clients on site.

The law has been a burden on the city's numerous home studio owners who, thanks to the Nashville Metro government's ban on client visits, are technically unable to charge musicians to record in their home studios. Most studio owners are able to fly under the radar. Those who are reported to Metro can have their businesses upended overnight.

That would include Lij Shaw, a Grammy Award-winning music producer profiled by Reason in April.

For years, Shaw ran his Toy Box Studio recording business out of his Nashville home without incident. In 2015, he was hit with a cease and desist letter from Metro, which demanded that he stop receiving clients at his home, shut down his promotional YouTube channel, and strip information about his business from his website or else be fined.

In 2017, Shaw and Pat Raynor, whose home salon business also ran afoul of Nashville's client ban, sued the Nashville Metro government. The two were represented by the Institute for Justice, a public interest law firm, and the Beacon Center, a Tennessee free market think tank.

Their lawsuit argued that because Nashville couldn't show any actual harm Shaw or Raynor caused by receiving clients at their home, the city had no legitimate government interest in enforcing its ban on client visits. That ban, their lawsuit argued, was therefore irrational and violated the Tennessee Constitution's protection of one's right to earn a living.

In an opinion published Tuesday, however, Chancellor Anne Martin agreed with Nashville's argument that because one could imagine potential harms coming from allowing home businesses to service clients on-site, the Metro government's rules were rational, and therefore constitutional.

Shaw and Raynor's businesses, Martin wrote, "are like any others in that if the public is allowed to come to their residences as customers, it could disturb the residential nature of their neighborhoods, as well as foment a potential host of other problems."

"The ruling is tantamount to one that concludes that facts cannot override imaginary harms when it comes to economic rights," says Braden Boucek, an attorney with the Beacon Center. "Under our constitutional structure where the government is one of powers few and enumerated, that's not how it's supposed to be."

"Lij and Pat have a constitutional right to use their homes to earn an honest living," Institute for Justice attorney Keith Diggs said in a statement. "Today's ruling ignores Nashville's admission that Lij and Pat never threatened public health or safety. We will keep fighting for Lij and Pat until this unconstitutional law is overturned."

The Institute for Justice and the Beacon Center plan on appealing Tuesday's ruling. Until then, Nashville's music producers and other home businesses will have to hope and pray that code enforcement doesn't choose to single them out next.

Music City can continue its crackdown on home music studios thanks to a new ruling from the Davidson County Chancery Court in Tennessee upholding a Nashville law …
The Institute for Justice and the Beacon Center plan on appealing Tuesday's ruling.

Let me get this straight …

The Davidson Country Chancery Court upheld a Nashville law – Right?
The Institute for Justice and the Beacon Center plon on appeaing the ruling – Right?

I must be missing something.

Let me go check and see how the judicial system works.

The United States is renowned for having one of the most sophisticated judicial systems in the world. Every day thousands of people, including law enforcement officers, lawyers, judges, government officials and even accused criminals, take part in this system, hoping to settle disputes and work for justice. What makes this system even more remarkable is that it is able to operate successfully in a country as large and diverse as the United States. One of the keys to this success is a balanced and carefully ordered hierarchy: Several different federal courts control issues relating to federal law and each state has its own set of courts that can adapt to the needs of its people.
Of course, it’s all a bit more complicated than that and no system works perfectly, but learning how the judicial system works can be useful in case you ever need to file a law suit, defend yourself in court, claim damages from the government or even pay a traffic ticket. In this article we’ll talk about what the different types of courts do, how judges are appointed and the basics of jury duty. Let’s start by looking at the essential elements of the U.S. judicial system.
Judicial System Basics
The U.S. legal system is in part inherited from English common law and depends on an adversarial system of justice. In an adversarial system, litigants present their cases before a neutral party. The arguments expressed by each litigant (usually represented by lawyers) are supposed to allow the judge or jury to determine the truth about the conflict. Besides presenting written or oral arguments, evidence and testimony are collected by litigants and their lawyers and presented to the court. Mo< Litigants usually pay their own attorney’s fees in addition to a $150 350 fee for filing a civil case in federal court. (Plaintiffs who can’t afford the fee can ask to proceed without paying.) For criminal cases, the government provides a court-appointed attorney for anyone who can’t afford one.
Many rules exist regarding how evidence and testimony are presented, trial procedure, courtroom behavior and, etiquette and how evidence and testimony are presented. These rules are designed to promote fairness and allow each side an opportunity to adequately present its case. For federal courts, the rules are determined by committees composed of judges, professors and lawyers appointed by the Chief Justice of the United States. The rules are then approved by the Judicial Conference of the United States and become law unless Congress votes to reject or modify them. State courts and local courts have their own committees and procedural rules, sometimes adapted from the rules for the federal courts. Many judges also have their own rules guiding conduct in their courtrooms.
The majority of legal disputes in the U.S. are settled in state courts, but federal courts have considerable power. Many of their rulings become precedent, or a principle, law or interpretation of a law established by a court ruling. Precedent is generally respected by other courts when dealing with a case or situation similar to past precedent. This policy is known as stare decisis or “let the decision stand.” Precedent is sometimes overturned or disregarded by a court, but the policy generally provides continuity in courts’ interpretations of the law.

Hmmm …

The system worked in “Music City” as it was desogmed tp.

God Bless America …

Salute,
Gatlin