Law Commons^™

Retiring Social Security’S (Non)Payment At Death After Eight Decades, Alberto B. Lopez

Emory Law Journal Online

Section 202 of the Social Security Act, which originated in the 1939 Amendments to the 1935 Social Security Act, authorizes monthly benefits payments to an eligible person until the month prior to the month of death. Under this rule, an individual who dies on November 30th at 11:59 pm is not eligible to receive a check for benefits accrued during November because the individual failed to survive one additional minute; eligibility for payment ended on October 31st. After a beneficiary’s death, the Social Security Administration (“SSA”) either prevents deposit of a check for month-of-death benefits or mandates …

Keeping It In The Family: The Pitfalls Of Naming A Family Member As A Trustee, Richard C. Ausness

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

This article is concerned with trusts in which either the settlor, trustee, or beneficiaries are members of the same family. For example, the settlors may be the parents, grandparents, or other relatives of the trust beneficiaries. Trustees may be settlors, parents of the beneficiaries, children of the settlor, and other family members, while beneficiaries may include either the settlor, the settlor's spouse, children, grandchildren, or other relatives of the settlor. These persons will be referred to as "family members."

Virtually all family members have disagreements with other family members and sometimes these disagreements can destroy relationships and even lead to …

The Nonfiduciary "Trust", Jeffrey A. Schoenblum

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

This article identifies and details the emergence in an increasing number of states of a new trust law that rejects the fundamental tenets of traditional trust law. This alternative concept of the trust liberates the trustee from any meaningful accountability to the beneficiary, the very core concept of traditional trust law. In short, these states are enabling the creation of what might be described as a "nonfiduciary trust."

Regularizing The Trust Protector, Paul B. Miller

Journal Articles

Increasingly, settlors of trusts in on-shore jurisdictions are making use of trust protectors. Protectors serve a variety of functions but generally speaking they are appointed to provide additional security for settlors’ expectations that trusts will be administered in accordance with their intentions. Given the potential breadth and variety of functions performed and powers wielded by protectors, their use generates important and profound theoretical issues. Taking its cues from recent efforts to regularize trust protection, this essay addresses questions concerning the extension of fiduciary duties to trust protectors. Amongst other things, it questions the tenability of proposals for broad extension of …

Planned Parenthood: Adult Adoption And The Right Of Adoptees To Inherit, Richard C. Ausness

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

This Article is concerned with the effect of adult adoptions on the inheritance rights (in the broad sense of that term) of adult adoptees. The Article contends many adult adoption statutes assume the existence of a parent-child relationship in which the adopter is the “parent” and the adoptee is a “child” even though this is not true of all adult adoption cases. In addition, legislatures and courts frequently fail to differentiate between “quasi-familial” adoptions and “strategic” adoptions, particularly where inheritance rights are concerned.

Copyright Trust, Abraham Bell, Gideon Parchomovsky

All Faculty Scholarship

Collaborative production of expressive content accounts for an ever growing number of copyrighted works. Indeed, in the age of content sharing and peer production, collaborative efforts may have become the paradigmatic form of authorship. Surprisingly, though, copyright law continues to view the single author model as the dominant model of peer production. Copyright law’s approach to authorship is currently based on a hodgepodge of rigid doctrines that conflate ownership and control. The result is a binary system under which a contributor to a collaborative work is either recognized as an author with a full control and management rights or a …

“I’M Not Quite Dead Yet!”: Rethinking Anti-Lapse Redistribution Of A Dead Beneficiary’S Gift, Eloisa Rodriguez-Dod

Faculty Publications

Anti-lapse statutes create a category of substitute takers when a beneficiary prematurely dies. They are based on the legislature’s presumption of how a testator or settlor would want his property distributed in these circumstances. However, a testator’s or settlor’s intent may effectively be frustrated by this presumed intent.

This Article critically examines the tension between an individual’s autonomy and societal goals in the context of anti-lapse statutes applicable to wills and trusts. It scrutinizes the current rules of construction regarding anti-lapse statutes and identifies their deficiencies in their application to wills and trusts. This Article analyzes and identifies the deficiencies …

Shoemaker V. Gindlesberger: The Lack Of Privity Defense Survives, But Just Barely, Alan Newman

Akron Law Faculty Publications

In Shoemaker v. Gindlesberger, decided in May of this year, the Ohio Supreme Court held that: “A beneficiary of a decedent's will may not maintain a negligence action against an attorney for the preparation of a deed that results in increased tax liability for the estate.” In doing so, the Court approved and followed its 1987 decision in Simon v. Zipperstein. Under Zipperstein, an attorney who prepares a will for a client can not be liable in negligence to a third person the client intended to benefit under the will unless (i) the third person was in privity with the …

The Offshore Asset Protection Trust: A Prudent Financial Planning Device Or The Last Refuge Of A Scoundrel?, Richard C. Ausness

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

In recent years, a large number of Americans have established "asset protection trusts" in foreign countries. An asset protection trust is a self-settled spendthrift trust which is created in order to protect the settlor's property from the claims of creditors. Virtually all American jurisdictions recognize spendthrift trusts, which prohibit both voluntary and involuntary alienation of a third party beneficiary's interest in a trust; however, most do not allow a settlor who has retained a beneficial interest in a spendthrift trust to protect that interest from the claims of creditors. A growing number of present and former British possessions, however, have …

Powers Of Withdrawal, Claims For Set-Off, And Spendthrift Protection, Alan Newman

Akron Law Faculty Publications

If a beneficiary of a spendthrift trust has a right to withdraw property from the trust, may the beneficiary’s creditors reach the assets subject to the withdrawal power? That was the principle question recently addressed by the 1st District Court of Appeals in Great American Insurance Company v. Thompson Trust. Also of interest: the case may have involved an offset by the trustee of amounts distributable to the beneficiary to repay amounts owed by the beneficiary to the trust.

Recent Case Developments, Jeffrey W. Stempel

Scholarly Works

Recent case developments in Insurance law in the year 1998-1999.

Recent Case Developments, Jeffrey W. Stempel

Scholarly Works

Recent case developments in Insurance Law in years 1998 and 1999.

Erisa: The Arbitrary And Capricious Rule Under Siege, George Lee Flint Jr

Faculty Articles

While ERISA sets forth an explicit standard that the plan administrator’s actions must meet those of a prudent man acting in like circumstances, courts have applied the arbitrary and capricious standard of review to administrator decisions. Courts should apply the arbitrary and capricious standard only when dealing with disinterested plan administrators acting properly under ERISA. The arbitrary and capricious rule was applied to post-ERISA decisions as a continuation of the pre-ERISA precedent, which established the rule through the continued development of common law from union negotiated employee benefit plans decided under the Labor Management Relations Act. Unfortunately, this continuation of …

Equitable Adjustments: A Survey And Analysis Of Precedents And Practice, Michael D. Carrico, John T. Bondurant

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.