Some of the weird laws in Tennessee are genuinely on the books: you can’t own a pet skunk, you can’t catch a fish with anything but a rod, reel, or trotline, duelists are permanently disqualified from public office, sharing a streaming password is technically theft of services, and flying a drone over your neighbor’s yard to spy on them is a crime. A few of the stranger “laws” that get shared online, though, don’t actually exist.
You Can Only Catch Fish Three Ways
The viral version of this one says Tennessee bans lassoing fish. The statute never uses that word. What it does is list the only legal methods and prohibit everything else: a rod and reel, a hand-held hook and line, or a trotline with no more than 100 hooks checked at least once a day. Any other instrument is forbidden unless a separate regulation carves out an exception.1Justia. Tennessee Code 70-4-104 – Catching or Killing Fish – Fishing Regulations
So a lasso would be illegal. So would a net, a spear, or your bare hands. Violations fall under a Class C misdemeanor, which carries up to 30 days in jail and a fine capped at $50.2Justia. Tennessee Code 40-35-111 – Authorized Terms of Imprisonment and Fines for Felonies and Misdemeanors Court costs usually dwarf the fine.
Pet Skunks Are Illegal
You cannot import, possess, sell, or transfer a live skunk in Tennessee. Every species is covered, and the ban exists primarily as a rabies-control measure. The only exceptions are legitimate zoos and research institutions.3Justia. Tennessee Code 70-4-208 – Unlawful Importation of Skunks – Penalty
Skunks fit into a broader framework. Tennessee sorts wildlife into classes with escalating permit rules. Class I animals, including lions, elephants, and large primates, are considered inherently dangerous and cannot be kept as personal pets. Class IV animals, which include white-tailed deer, black bears, and wild turkeys, are also entirely off-limits for private possession, with only accredited zoos and TWRA-authorized rehabilitators allowed to hold them.4Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency. Wildlife Permits Available
You Can Keep Roadkill, but a Deer Means a Phone Call
Tennessee lets anyone possess and eat a wild animal accidentally killed by a car. The state would rather the meat feed somebody than rot on the shoulder. Larger game comes with reporting rules, though. If you pick up a deer, you have 48 hours to contact the Wildlife Resources Agency or any law enforcement officer and give your name and address. For a bear, you can’t take possession at all until a TWRA enforcement officer arrives and issues a kill tag.5Justia. Tennessee Code 70-4-115 – Destruction and Disposal of Wildlife – Permit – Penalty
Smaller animals like raccoons and rabbits carry no notification requirement. And if you report a deer to a local police officer rather than TWRA directly, that officer is legally responsible for passing the information along.5Justia. Tennessee Code 70-4-115 – Destruction and Disposal of Wildlife – Permit – Penalty Despite what some online summaries claim, turkey is not on the notification list.
No Hunting From a Moving Vehicle
It’s illegal in Tennessee to chase, hunt, or kill any wild bird or animal from a motorized boat, airplane, car, or any other powered vehicle.6Justia. Tennessee Code 70-4-109 – Hunting From Aircraft, Watercraft or Motor Vehicles Unlawful – Exception for Persons Confined to Wheelchairs – Penalty The statute is written so that no regulation can ever authorize hunting from a car with its engine running.
One narrow exception exists. A person who is permanently confined to a wheelchair and has proper certification from the TWRA executive director can hunt from a stationary vehicle during regular seasons. Even then, the hunter cannot shoot across a road or path, must have a non-wheelchair-bound companion present at all times, and that companion is responsible for retrieving all game.6Justia. Tennessee Code 70-4-109 – Hunting From Aircraft, Watercraft or Motor Vehicles Unlawful – Exception for Persons Confined to Wheelchairs – Penalty This is not a general disability accommodation; the statute requires permanent wheelchair confinement.
Duelists Are Banned From Public Office for Life
The Tennessee Constitution still says anyone who fights a duel, carries a challenge to fight one, sends or accepts a challenge, or helps someone else in a duel is permanently barred from holding any office of honor or profit in the state.7Justia. Tennessee Constitution Article IX – Disqualifications – Section 3 That sweeps in governor, county clerk, judge, school board member, and everything in between. The provision dates from an era when political disputes genuinely escalated to pistols at dawn.
Right next to it, Article IX, Section 2 says no person who denies the existence of God or a “future state of rewards and punishments” can hold any civil office.8Justia. Tennessee Constitution Article IX – Disqualifications – Section 2 That clause has been legally unenforceable since the U.S. Supreme Court struck down religious tests for public office in 1961.9Justia. Torcaso v. Watkins, 367 U.S. 488 (1961) The text stays in the constitution because amending it is procedurally heavy and nobody has pushed to remove the dead language.
Flying a Drone Over Private Property Can Be a Crime
Tennessee went past FAA rules and created its own criminal penalties for drone misuse. Using a drone to intentionally capture images of a person or private property for surveillance is a Class C misdemeanor. The same charge applies to flying one over an open-air event with more than 100 people without the venue’s consent, over a correctional facility, or within 250 feet of critical infrastructure like power plants and refineries. There is a built-in defense for images captured accidentally and then destroyed immediately, without being shown or distributed.10Justia. Tennessee Code 39-13-903 – Unlawful Capture of Image
Sharing a Streaming Password Is Theft of Services
In 2011, Tennessee became the first state to criminalize sharing login credentials for entertainment subscription services. The legislature amended the theft-of-services statute to explicitly include “entertainment subscription services,” so using someone else’s streaming account without authorization is a crime. Thefts valued at $500 or less are a misdemeanor carrying up to a year in jail and a fine of up to $2,500; above $500 the penalties move into felony territory. Anyone “directly or indirectly harmed” has standing to report it.
The law was widely understood as aimed at large-scale password reselling rather than two siblings sharing a Netflix login, and enforcement against individual users has been essentially nonexistent. The statute is still on the books, though, and borrowing your friend’s credentials technically qualifies.
Alcohol Sales Shut Down for Three Holidays
Retail liquor stores in Tennessee can operate from 8 a.m. to 11 p.m. Monday through Saturday, with Sunday hours limited to 10 a.m. to 11 p.m. Wine sales in grocery stores follow the same schedule and only became legal statewide on January 1, 2019. All retail alcohol sales are banned outright on Christmas, Thanksgiving, and Easter.11Tennessee Alcoholic Beverage Commission. Frequently Asked Questions
Bars and restaurants can still pour drinks on those three holidays. You just can’t buy a bottle to take home. Wineries can open on Sundays but must close between midnight and 8 a.m. every day of the week.11Tennessee Alcoholic Beverage Commission. Frequently Asked Questions
The Weird Laws That Aren’t Actually Real
Not every strange Tennessee statute you’ve seen on a listicle actually exists. The widely repeated claim that it’s illegal to sell hollow logs in Tennessee, sometimes pinned on Knoxville, is false. Legal experts have confirmed no such law exists anywhere in the state’s code. The Memphis “sleeping while driving” ordinance is similarly unverifiable; a search of the Memphis Code of Ordinances turns up nothing matching that description. The city does have modern restrictions on sleeping in vehicles on public property, but those are anti-camping measures, not holdovers from the horse-and-buggy era.
You’ll also see claims that Tennessee has a specific law against public profanity, often citing TCA § 39-17-301. That section is a definitions provision covering terms like “riot” and “desecrate.” It says nothing about profanity.12Justia. Tennessee Code 39-17-301 – Part Definitions Public outbursts in Tennessee are handled under the disorderly conduct statute, which targets fighting, unreasonable noise, and refusing to disperse near an emergency, and never mentions offensive words.13Justia. Tennessee Code 39-17-305 – Disorderly Conduct Tennessee has plenty of genuinely strange provisions on the books. It doesn’t need the invented ones.