Tennessee Code Title 65. Public Utilities and Carriers § 65-21-109

(a) Every telegraph or telephone company doing business in this state must, under a penalty of five hundred dollars ($500) for each and every refusal so to do, transmit over its wires to localities on its lines, for any individual or corporation or other telegraph or telephone company, such messages, dispatches, or correspondence, as may be tendered to it by, or to be transmitted to, any individual or corporation, or other telegraph or telephone companies, at the price customarily asked and obtained for the transmission of similar messages, dispatches, or correspondence, without discrimination as to charges or promptness.

(b) The penalty herein prescribed shall be recoverable in any court through proper form of law, one-half ( 1/2 ) of which shall go to the prosecutor and one-half ( 1/2 ) to the state.