Ray Barrett, who served Nashville courts, elections for five decades, dies at 88

Longtime Nashville court and elections official Ray Barrett, who served Metro government for more than five decades, died Tuesday in Franklin. Barrett was 88.

During his 52 years in the Metro Nashville government, he was the clerk and master of the Davidson County Chancery Court and later the Davidson County administrator of elections.

Barrett was also the president of the Tennessee County Officials Association and the Tennessee Quarter Horse Association. He began working as a court officer for the Circuit Court Judges of Williamson County in 2011.

He served for 32 years in the Tennessee Air National Guard, retiring as a lieutenant colonel.

Barrett was appointed the elections administrator after his predecessor was fired in 2004, inheriting a tumultuous office. While his own term was not without controversy, notably when in 2007 a laptop containing voters' Social Security information was stolen from the commission, officials said he brought respect and stability to the office.

“He has the respect of the Republican and the Democrat alike,” then-election commission chairman Lynn Greer said in a July 2010 Tennessean article. “He treated every person the same. Ray came in during tumultuous times and settled everything down.”

Barrett was born to the late Jesse Marlin and Pattie Louise Barrett and was a 1954 graduate of Isaac Litton High School where he played football and basketball.

He went on to play college football at South Georgia College and Vanderbilt University, where he graduated from. He then attended the Nashville School of Law and received his doctor of jurisprudence in 1962.

Barrett is preceded in death by his son, Raymond Lester Barrett Jr., and survived by his wife, Debbie McMillan Barrett, four children, 12 grandchildren and seven great-grandchildren.

His funeral is scheduled for Saturday morning in Franklin. His pallbearers will include Tennessee Supreme Court Justice Jeff Bivins and Tennessee Department of Safety and Homeland Security Commissioner Jeff Long.

Memorials may be made to St. Jude Children’s Hospital or Salvation Army, per his obituary from Williamson Memorial Funeral Home.

Evan Mealins is the justice reporter for The Tennessean. Contact him at emealins@gannett.com or follow him on Twitter @EvanMealins.

This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Ray Barrett, who served Nashville for five decades, dies at 88