Estates and Trusts Commons^™

Discretionary Trusts: An Update, Richard C. Ausness

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

In the past, settlors tended to limit a trustee’s discretion by setting forth a specific formula for the distribution of trust assets. Nowadays, however, settlors often prefer to vest more discretion in their trustees. This is partly due to the fact that beneficiaries tend to live longer and, therefore, trusts inevitably last longer, thereby requiring trustees to respond to changing conditions. In addition, settlors often believe that vesting increased discretion on the part of trustees will discourage beneficiaries from bringing expensive and disruptive challenges to their decisions.

Nevertheless, the trend toward increased discretion is not without its problems. First of …

The Prince Estate: How Intestacy Works, How It Could Work, And How It Fails As An Estate Plan, Dennis M. Patrick, Beth T. Morrison

Mitchell Hamline Law Review

No abstract provided.

Change Is Constant In Estate Planning: Reflections Of An Actec Law Journal Editor, Bridget J. Crawford

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

Change is the only constant in the life of a trusts and estates professional. The law changes; the needs of clients change; the methods for achieving certain results change; technology and modes of communication change. So, too, it can be said that change is the only constant running through more than forty years of our organization's flagship publication.

The Federal Law Of Property: The Case Of Inheritance Disclaimers And Tenancy By The Entireties, David Gray Carlson

Washington and Lee Law Review

No abstract provided.

A Will For Willa Cather, Thomas Simmons

Faculty Publications

Artists hold their creative works dear. Whether paintings, poems, or songs, their human creators treat them with special care and often desire that same care be exercised after death. Some may wish to ban the use of a song in a television commercial. Others may wish to stop their novel from being turned into an animated Disney movie. But directing particular uses of property from the grave can be met with several objections and legal impediments. The objections sound in alarmist responses to “dead hand control.” The impediments include the Rule Against Perpetuities, uncertainty, capriciousness, and the repugnancy of restraints …

The Timing Of Testation, Mark Glover

Kentucky Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Wills & Trusts, Gerry W. Beyer

SMU Annual Texas Survey

No abstract provided.

Equitable Relief For Erisa Benefit Plan Designation Mistakes, Raymond C. O'Brien

Scholarly Articles

Since its enactment in 1974, the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) and related insurance and disability programs provided retirement security for employees and employers, amassing more than $9 trillion in protected assets. Congress preempted conflicting state laws so as to promote certainty of distribution and ease of administration, two hallmarks of ERISA-governed plans. Nonetheless, since 1974, American society embraced spousal equality, an increased number of marriages end in divorce, and wealth most often passes through nonprobate transfers such as insurance contracts and pension policy plans. To accommodate these societal and wealth changes, states enacted statutes to provide elective share …

The Madness Of Insane Delusions, Kevin Bennardo

Faculty Publications

This Article shares two ideas for reform of the law surrounding testators' expressed preferences and the doctrine of insane delusions.

First, the doctrine of insane delusions should not be applied to devises that seek to advance beliefs, ideas, or viewpoints. There is just too great of a risk that judges and juries will strike down such devises when the testator’s viewpoints diverge from their own.

Second, the time may have come to admit that the law of wills is not as committed to the principle of testamentary freedom as it is often espoused to be. The literature is rife with …

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 …

Who Will Judge The Many When The Game Is Through: Considering The Profound Differences Between Mental Health Courts And Traditional Involuntary Civil Commitment Courts, Michael L. Perlin

Articles & Chapters

This paper is an expansion of a presentation given by the author at the annual Therapeutic Jurisprudence Workshop at Osgoode Hall Law School, York University, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, October 15, 2016. There is a developing robust literature about mental health courts (MHCrts) in the United States, and researchers have begun to focus on a broad range of empirical issues, such as the extent to which defendants are competent to waive their trial rights in such settings, the significance of diversion, etc. Also, advocates and other scholars have engaged in vigorous debates about the value of these courts, and the extent …

Income Tax Concerns With Purpose Trusts, Thomas Simmons

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

United States V. Osage Wind, Llc, Summer Carmack

Public Land & Resources Law Review

The Osage Nation, as owner of the beneficial interest in its mineral estate, issues federally-approved leases to persons and entities who wish to conduct mineral development on its lands. After an energy-development company, Osage Wind, leased privately-owned surface lands within Tribal reservation boundaries and began to excavate minerals for purposes of constructing a wind farm, the United States brought suit on the Tribe’s behalf. In the ensuing litigation, the Osage Nation insisted that Osage Wind should have obtained a mineral lease from the Tribe before beginning its work. In its decision, the Tenth Circuit applied one of the Indian law …

Wills, Trusts, Guardianships, And Fiduciary Administration, Mary F. Radford

Mercer Law Review

This Article describes selected cases and significant legislation from June 1, 2016 to May 31, 2017 that pertain to Georgia fiduciary law and estate planning.

Maximizing Ponzi Loss Deductions For Estate And Income Tax Purposes: Are Taxpayers Better Off Dead?, Valrie Chambers, Brian Elzweig

William & Mary Business Law Review

There is a long history of cases interpreting whether a theft loss deduction for securities fraud is allowable for personal income taxes. The cases require that for a theft loss to be actionable as such, it would have to meet the requirements of the common law definition of theft in the U.S. state in which it occurred. This generally requires direct privity between the person claiming the loss and the person who committed the theft. Because most securities transactions are brokered, the direct privity is lost and a theft loss deduction is denied in favor a capital loss. Recently, in …

Wills, Trusts, And Estates, J. William Gray Jr., Katherine E. Ramsey

University of Richmond Law Review

The Supreme Court of Virginia has handed down seven recent

decisions addressing the authority of an agent to change the principal's

estate plan, legal malpractice claims in estate planning,

rights of incapacitated adults, limits of the constructive trust doctrine,

effects of a reversionary clause in a deed, ownership of an

engagement ring, and proof of undue influence. The 2017 Virginia

General Assembly clarified rules on legal malpractice and tenancies

by the entireties, adopted the Uniform Trust Decanting Act

and the Uniform Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act, and expanded

provisions governing estate administration, life insurance,

and advance medical directives. Other …

Introducing Virtual Representation, Thomas Simmons

Faculty Publications

The general rule that a person cannot be bound by an agreement or decree unless she received notice encounters practical difficulties where a person is missing, incompetent, a minor, unascertained, or even unborn. All beneficiaries are necessary parties in a trust proceeding. But short of appointing a guardian ad litem to represent persons who are difficult to notice, uncertainty and inefficiencies would be encountered were it not for the doctrine of virtual representation. Under the doctrine of virtual representation, persons - even if not yet in existence - can be held to be parties to a proceeding or an agreement …

Raising The Dead: An Examination Of In Re Kingsbury And Maine's Law Regarding Intestate Succession And Posthumous Paternity Testing, Dylan R. Boyd

Maine Law Review

In 2001, Ben Erskine, a man who claimed to be the son of renowned guru Paramahansa Yogananda, planned to ask a Los Angeles judge to order that the guru's body be exhumed for DNA testing to determine Erskine's paternity. Erskine's allegations threatened both Yogananda's reputation and the fortune of his estate, which belonged to his organization the Self Realization Fellowship. In 2002, seven years after the allegations arose, conclusive tests comparing Erskine's DNA and that of Yogananda's surviving male relatives in India resolved the controversy and vindicated the guru, thus putting to rest the looming possibility of exhuming his body …

Fiduciary Obligations In Business And Investment: Implications Of Climate Change, Janis P. Sarra

All Faculty Publications

Fiduciary obligation, under both corporate law and the common law, requires directors and officers to identify and address climate-related financial and other risks. In fulfilling their obligations to act in the best interests of the company, directors and officers must directly engage with developments in knowledge regarding physical and transition risks related to climate change and how these risks may impact their corporation. Depending on the firm’s economic activities, the risk may be minor or highly significant, but directors and officers have an obligation to make the inquiries, to devise strategies to address risks, and to have an ongoing monitoring …

Please Don’T Make Me Pay Taxes: How New Irs Law Helps Art Collectors Avoid Hefty Taxes, Stephanie Dunn

Journal of the National Association of Administrative Law Judiciary

No abstract provided.