Tennessee Dash Cams: Windshield Mounting Is Written Into the Law

Start with what Tennessee does not have. The state's obstruction offense, T.C.A. § 55-8-165, is written entirely around load and people: subsection (a) forbids driving a vehicle "so loaded, or when there are in the front seat such a number of persons, exceeding four (4)," as to obstruct the driver's view to the front or sides, and subsection (b) forbids a passenger riding in a position that interferes with the driver's view ahead or to the sides. Nothing in it reaches an object stuck to the glass. A full text search of the Tennessee Code returns sixteen sections using the word "windshield," and they cover tint, wipers, safety glazing, headlight use in rain, goggles for motorcyclists and a handful of registration and towing provisions. None of them creates a permitted zone, a corner rule or a maximum size for a device on the windshield the way Florida, California and several other states do.

What Tennessee has instead is an affirmative permission. The Hands Free Tennessee law, enacted as Public Chapter 412 of 2019 and effective July 1, 2019, generally bars a driver from physically holding a phone or a stand-alone electronic device, from writing or reading text, from reaching for a device out of a seated and belted position, from watching video, and, in subdivision (b)(1)(E), from recording or broadcasting video. The same subdivision then adds the sentence that decides the dash-cam question: "This subdivision (b)(1) does not apply to electronic devices used for the sole purpose of continuously recording or broadcasting video within or outside of the motor vehicle." A device that runs a continuous loop and does nothing else is outside the whole of (b)(1), not merely outside the video clause.

The mounting rule sits in (b)(2). It allows a driver to activate or deactivate a feature by hand while driving if the device "is mounted on the vehicle's windshield, dashboard, or center console in a manner that does not hinder the driver's view of the road" and the action is a single swipe or tap. The same subdivision draws the line for a phone doing double duty as a camera: the swipe may not activate camera, video or gaming features for viewing, recording, amusement or other non-navigational purposes, with a narrow exception for functions tied to transporting people or property for compensation. So a purpose-built dash cam is fine and a phone in a cradle is fine for navigation, but tapping a phone to start recording while driving is not.

The second statute a driver has to clear is § 55-9-105, which bans operating or installing a television receiver, video monitor or screen capable of displaying a broadcast or video signal producing entertainment or business applications if it is intended to display images visible to the driver in a normal position while the vehicle is in motion. Subdivision (c)(1)(C) lifts that ban for "a visual display used to enhance or supplement the driver's view forward, behind, or to the sides of a motor vehicle," which is precisely what a dash cam's live preview and a backup or blind-spot camera do. Subdivisions (c)(1)(A) and (B) separately exempt a vehicle information display and a navigation or GPS display, and (c)(1)(D) exempts a screen designed to prevent the driver seeing entertainment while the vehicle is driven.

Audio is a one-party-consent question in Tennessee. Section 39-13-601(b)(5) makes it lawful for a person not acting under colour of law to intercept a wire, oral or electronic communication where that person is a party to the communication or one of the parties has given prior consent, unless the interception is for the purpose of committing a criminal or tortious act. A camera that records the cabin while the owner is in the car therefore has a party's consent; recording conversations the owner is not part of, for example by leaving the camera running for passengers alone, does not fit that exception.

A dash cam that simply records continuously is outside § 55-8-199(b)(1) altogether, so no penalty attaches to having it mounted or running. Handling a phone or a stand-alone device to start a recording is a different matter: a violation of § 55-8-199 is a Class C misdemeanor, but the section sets its own money instead of the usual ceiling. 00), rising to one hundred dollars ($100) for a third or subsequent offense or where the violation results in an accident, and two hundred dollars ($200) in a work zone with department of transportation employees or construction workers present or in a marked school zone with the warning flashers operating.

00) administrative fee is retained by the court clerk. A first offender may take a driver education course under § 55-10-301 in lieu of the fine; a second or subsequent violation by a driver under eighteen adds seven points to the driving record; and subsection (e) makes a citation based solely on this section a moving traffic violation. A screen that shows entertainment or business applications to the driver in motion is a separate Class C misdemeanor under § 55-9-105(e), and mounting a camera so bulky that it interferes with a front-seat passenger's position could still reach § 55-8-165, itself a Class C misdemeanor.