The Grand Divisions of Tennessee

Tennessee is one state in three parts: East Tennessee, Middle Tennessee and West Tennessee. The three are more than a figure of speech. The state's Code names them and lists the counties in each. The flag gives each one a star. And the Tennessee Constitution builds them into the Supreme Court: no more than two of the court's five judges may live in any one grand division, and the court is to meet in Knoxville, Nashville and Jackson, a city in each.

Where the line comes from

The land drew the lines first. Head west from the North Carolina line and you cross the Unaka Mountains, the range that holds the Great Smokies, then East Tennessee's Great Valley, where long ridges and valleys run side by side from northeast to southwest. Then the Cumberland Plateau rises, its eastern edge about 750 feet above the valley floor. Past the plateau the ground steps down to the Highland Rim and into the Central Basin, rolling farm country with the Rim on every side. Beyond the western Rim runs the Tennessee River, and past its valley the Coastal Plain stretches low and mostly level to the Mississippi.

The Tennessee River marks the line between Middle and West. It begins at Knoxville, runs southwest past Chattanooga into Alabama, then turns north and crosses the whole state to Kentucky. West Tennessee starts at that northbound stretch. Still, the Code draws the line by counties, not by the river, and Hardin County, which the Code puts in the west, lies on both banks.

The line between East and Middle is harder to see. Geographers and geologists disagree about which division the Cumberland Plateau belongs to, and the Code's lists split it. Cumberland County, up on the plateau, is East Tennessee. Van Buren County, mostly plateau too, is Middle. Fall Creek Falls State Park lies along the county line between Van Buren and Bledsoe, and Bledsoe is East.

People came the way the land runs, from east to west. By the early 1770s, settlers from Virginia and North Carolina had crossed the mountains to farm along the Watauga, Holston and Nolichucky rivers, and in 1772 the Watauga settlers formed a government of their own. In 1779 and 1780, James Robertson led one party overland and John Donelson led another by river to the French Lick on the Cumberland, where Nashville grew. The plateau between them drew few settlers and slowed the move west. West Tennessee came last: the Chickasaws ceded it by treaty in 1818, it opened to settlers in 1819, and Memphis was founded that year on a bluff above the Mississippi.

The law followed. The Constitution of 1834 gave the Supreme Court three judges, one from each grand division. The Constitution of 1870, still in force, raised the number to five and allowed no more than two from any one division.

What the Code says

Title 4 of the Tennessee Code Annotated gives the divisions a part of their own, which opens with one sentence:

There are three (3) grand divisions of the state: the eastern, middle and western.

That is § 4-1-201. The next three sections, §§ 4-1-202, 4-1-203 and 4-1-204, are the county lists for the eastern, middle and western divisions, each saying its division "comprises the counties of" the names that follow. Together they name all 95 of Tennessee's counties, each list in alphabetical order.

East Tennessee: 33 counties

The eastern division, as § 4-1-202 lists it:

• Anderson
• Bledsoe
• Blount
• Bradley
• Campbell
• Carter
• Claiborne
• Cocke
• Cumberland
• Grainger
• Greene
• Hamblen
• Hamilton
• Hancock
• Hawkins
• Jefferson
• Johnson
• Knox
• Loudon
• Marion
• McMinn
• Meigs
• Monroe
• Morgan
• Polk
• Rhea
• Roane
• Scott
• Sevier
• Sullivan
• Unicoi
• Union
• Washington

Middle Tennessee: 41 counties

The middle division, as § 4-1-203 lists it:

• Bedford
• Cannon
• Cheatham
• Clay
• Coffee
• Davidson
• DeKalb
• Dickson
• Fentress
• Franklin
• Giles
• Grundy
• Hickman
• Houston
• Humphreys
• Jackson
• Lawrence
• Lewis
• Lincoln
• Macon
• Marshall
• Maury
• Montgomery
• Moore
• Overton
• Perry
• Pickett
• Putnam
• Robertson
• Rutherford
• Sequatchie
• Smith
• Stewart
• Sumner
• Trousdale
• Van Buren
• Warren
• Wayne
• White
• Williamson
• Wilson

West Tennessee: 21 counties

The western division, as § 4-1-204 lists it:

• Benton
• Carroll
• Chester
• Crockett
• Decatur
• Dyer
• Fayette
• Gibson
• Hardeman
• Hardin
• Haywood
• Henderson
• Henry
• Lake
• Lauderdale
• Madison
• McNairy
• Obion
• Shelby
• Tipton
• Weakley

How the three differ

The land climbs from west to east. Along the Mississippi, parts of the floodplain lie below 200 feet in elevation, and most of West Tennessee is low and fairly level. The Central Basin averages a little over 500 feet, and the Highland Rim around it about 1,000. The Cumberland Plateau averages about 2,000 feet and rises near 3,000 in places. In the Smokies, Kuwohi, the peak long called Clingmans Dome, rises to 6,643 feet, the highest point in the state. The weather follows the height. A Smokies summit can be 10 to 20 degrees cooler than the foot of the mountain, and the growing season runs about 160 days in the eastern mountains and about 260 in the state's southwest corner.

Each division has its rivers and its cities. East Tennessee's two big cities stand on the Tennessee River: Knoxville, where the Holston and the French Broad meet to form it, and Chattanooga, where it carves a long gorge through Walden Ridge. The Cumberland River dips down from Kentucky through Middle Tennessee and Nashville, the state capital, then turns back into Kentucky to join the Ohio. The Mississippi is West Tennessee's western edge, and Memphis stands on the bluffs above it.

The farms differ too. East Tennessee's Great Valley is a country of small farms. The Central Basin, prized for its fertile soil, runs to larger farms and cattle. Most of West Tennessee's Coastal Plain is flatter and more heavily farmed than any other part of the state, and it grows most of Tennessee's cotton.

The three stars

The flag puts the same idea in one picture. LeRoy Reeves, a lawyer from Johnson City and a captain in the Third Regiment, Tennessee Infantry, designed it, and the General Assembly adopted it on April 17, 1905. Reeves explained the design himself: "The three stars are of pure white, representing the three grand divisions of the state. They are bound together by the endless circle of the blue field, the symbol being three bound together in one—an indissoluble trinity." It first flew over the Johnson City armory on May 22, 1905.

The law fixes where the stars go. Section 4-1-301(a) of the Code sets out the flag's design down to its proportions, and it ends with the stars: no two of their centers may sit on a line parallel to the flag's side or end, and "the highest star shall be the one nearest the upper confined corner of the flag." The same section puts the blue bar at the flag's free end, so the confined corner is the top corner by the staff. The flag came nearly 109 years after statehood, which Tennessee celebrates every June 1. Statehood Day marks June 1, 1796, when Congress voted Tennessee into the Union as its sixteenth state.

Where to go next

Our East Tennessee collection gathers our designs for the eastern division, from the Smokies to Chattanooga.

Our Middle Tennessee collection holds our designs for Nashville and the rest of the middle division.

Our West Tennessee collection covers the western division, between the Tennessee River and the Mississippi.

In our State Parks Guide, from Roan Mountain in the east to Reelfoot Lake in the west, each park's page tells its story and names other parks in its division.

Sources: Tenn. Code Ann. §§ 4-1-201 to 4-1-204 and 4-1-301, codes.findlaw.com (current as of January 2, 2024); Tennessee Constitution, Article VI, Section 2; Tennessee Secretary of State, "Tennessee State Symbols"; Tennessee Blue Book 2025–2026; Tennessee Encyclopedia, "Geologic Zones" (Edward T. Luther), "Ecological Systems" (Richard P. Gildrie), "Tennessee Supreme Court" (Ward DeWitt, Jr.), "Watauga Association," "James Robertson," "Jackson Purchase," "Memphis," "Tennessee River System," "Cumberland River," "Hardin County," "Cumberland County," "Van Buren County," "Madison County" and "Fall Creek Falls State Park"; National Park Service, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, "Weather" and "Kuwohi name restored to the highest peak in the Smokies"; East Tennessee State University, "Tennessee Climatology"; Archives of Appalachia, East Tennessee State University, "Tennessee State Flag (1905 design)". This is not legal advice.