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Tennessee is a state located in the Southern United States.
Tennessee is known as the "Volunteer State", a nickname
earned during the War of 1812 because of the prominent role
played by volunteer soldiers from Tennessee, especially during
the Battle of New Orleans. The capital city is Nashville,
and the largest city is Memphis.
Middle Tennessee is a distinct
portion of the state of Tennessee, delineated according to
law as the Middle Grand Division of Tennessee. Middle Tennessee
consists of that portion of the state east of the Tennessee
River's western crossing of the state and west of the dividing
line between the Eastern and Central time zones. Exceptions
to this rule are that Hardin County, which is located on both
sides of the Tennessee River, is considered to be entirely
in West Tennessee and that Bledsoe, Cumberland, Marion and
Sequatchie counties are generally considered to be in East
Tennessee despite being in the Central Time Zone. Also, the
current legal definition places Sequatchie County in the middle
grand division instead of the eastern division.
Middle Tennessee is known for
its rolling hills and fertile stream valleys, as well as for
its major city, Nashville, which is the state capital. Other
major sizeable cities in Middle Tennessee include Clarksville
and Murfreesboro. Politically, it has provided the Democratic
Party with some of its leading statesmen, and still is largely
inclined toward it, although an increasing Republican trend
has been seen in the Nashville suburbs. Geographically it
is composed predominantly of the Nashville Basin and the Highland
Rim, although the western portion of the Cumberland Plateau
also extends into Middle Tennessee.
Middle Tennessee also has an
abundance of institutions of higher learning--most notably
Vanderbilt, Belmont, Lipscomb and Tennessee State universities
in Nashville and Tennessee Tech University in Cookeville.
Other prominent universities are Austin Peay State University
in Clarksville, the University of the South in Sewanee, Cumberland
University in Lebanon, and Middle Tennessee State University
in Murfreesboro, which is the state's second largest institution
of higher learning, just behind the University of Tennessee
in Knoxville.
Unlike the geographic designations
of regions of most U.S. states, the term Middle Tennessee
has legal as well as socioeconomic meaning. Middle Tennessee,
along with West Tennessee and East Tennessee, comprises one
of the state's three Grand Divisions. According to the Tennessee
State Constitution, no more than two of the state supreme
court's five justices can come from any one Grand Division.
A similar rule applies to certain other commissions and boards
as well, to prevent them from showing a geographic bias. |
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