Rule 48.Juries of Less Than Twelve: Majority Verdict

Rule 48 is a single sentence that hands control to the parties themselves: they may stipulate that the jury will have fewer members than the number the law otherwise calls for, or that a verdict — or a finding on a particular issue — reached by a stated majority of jurors will count as the jury’s verdict or finding, instead of requiring every juror to agree.

Tennessee’s constitutional jury right ordinarily means a twelve-person jury reaching a unanimous verdict, a stricter baseline than many other systems use. Rule 48 lets the parties depart from that baseline by agreement, whether to save time and expense with a smaller panel, to make a lingering holdout less likely to force a mistrial, or both. Because the departure requires a stipulation, neither side can be forced into a smaller jury or a majority-verdict rule without agreeing to it.

The rule fits alongside Rule 47.02, which lets a court seat one or more additional jurors precisely because Tennessee ordinarily requires all twelve jurors to stay through deliberations — a structural need Rule 48 lets the parties bypass by agreeing in advance to proceed with fewer.