Estates and Trusts Commons^™

A Simpler Verifiable Gift Tax, Wendy G. Gerzog

All Faculty Scholarship

The purpose of this article is to propose a simpler verifiable gift tax, to reassert basic principles of transfer taxes, to encourage simple, outright gifts, and to eliminate some of the major abuses in the current gift tax regime. To accomplish these goals, the proposed tax would simplify gift completion rules, adopt a hard-to-complete rule of transfer taxation, reduce the annual exclusion while expanding the consumption exclusion, and employ loss of preference inducements to increase gift tax compliance.

Sherlock Holmes And The Problem Of The Dead Hand: The Modification And Termination Of "Irrevocable" Trusts, Richard C. Ausness

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

This Article is about the modification and termination of so-called “irrevocable” trusts. A trust may be made irrevocable at the time of its creation or it may become so at a later time. A testamentary trust is one that is embodied in a will and becomes effective at the testator’s death. Since the testator will be dead by the time the trust becomes effective, he will not be in a position to modify or revoke it. For the same reason, a revocable trust will become irrevocable when the settlor dies or when the power to revoke is released. Finally, an …

Beyond The Five Stages Of Grief: Best Practices For Estate Mediation And Advising The Bereaved Client, Louise M. Mimnagh

Osgoode Legal Studies Research Paper Series

In 1789, Benjamin Franklin famously wrote that nothing in this world is certain “except death and taxes.” Yet, as the baby boomer generation increasingly comprises our senior population, a third near-certainty has emerged: family disputes regarding the estate of a deceased family member. This article reviews the Canadian legislative response to these estate disputes thus far through the introduction of Rule 75.1 of the Ontario Rules of Civil Procedure. It is argued that the introduction of mandatory mediation provides the Estates Bar with an opportunity to review emerging demands on lawyers as well as mediation and bereavement literature in order …

A History Of Preferential Share In Ontario: Intestacy Legislation And Conceptions Of The Deserving Or Undeserving Widow, Louise M. Mimnagh, Mcnamara Pizzale

Osgoode Legal Studies Research Paper Series

Ontario’s current method for trying to ensure the fair distribution of an intestate’s estate, or the estate of an individual without a valid Last Will and Testament, is outlined in the Succession Law Reform Act. Specifically, section 45(1) outlines the foundational concept of a “preferential share,” which entitles the surviving spouse to a prescribed financial interest in the estate which is prioritized above all other heirs.

The concept of a preferential share stands in sharp contrast with historical English common law methods of devolving intestate estates in which legal entitlements were heavily influenced by an individual’s gender and marital status. …

Probate Actions And 'Suspicious Circumstances': A Third Standard Of Proof For Allegations Involving Moral Guilt, Louise M. Mimnagh

Osgoode Legal Studies Research Paper Series

When a will is challenged as being executed under suspicious circumstances, Canadian courts have historically sought clear, compelling, and cogent evidence to demonstrate the will’s validity. The associated standard of proof has been described as one residing beyond a balance of probabilities, and is conceptualized as the ‘third standard of proof’ in addition to the civil and criminal standards. This third standard of proof is also particularly appealing when allocating the risk of error in an estates context in which testators are deceased and no longer available to clarify their intentions or perspectives. However, after the 2008 Supreme Court of …

The Estate Planner's Income Tax Playbook, Samuel A. Donaldson

Faculty Publications By Year

No abstract provided.

Principles Of Contract Law Applied To Entertainment And Sports Contracts: A Model For Balancing The Rights Of The Industry With Protecting The Interests Of Minors, John H. Shannon, Richard J. Hunter Jr.

Loyola of Los Angeles Law Review

This Article discusses the context of common law and statutory materials dealing with minors who participate in the entertainment and sports fields. The Article describes the changes undertaken as a result of several notorious cases involving prominent child actors, and how the California legislature dealt with issues ranging from set asides of income, approval of contracts by a competent court of jurisdiction, recognition of the legitimate interests of all parties to the contract, to principles under which a minor would be precluded from disaffirming a contract. The Article then applies and extends the principles developed in entertainment contracts to minors …

Asset Preservation And The Evolving Role Of Trusts In The Twenty-First Century, Jay A. Soled, Mitchell M. Gans

Washington and Lee Law Review

For the vast majority of the twentieth century, trusts served two pivotal roles. The first was as a vehicle to help mitigate federal and state estate tax burdens, the rates of which could be quite significant. The second was to assist in asset preservation, safeguarding trust beneficiaries from their profligacy, former spouses, creditors, and the like.

At the start of the twenty-first century, Congress passed legislation that curtailed the impact of the federal estate tax, and many state legislatures have followed suit, either eliminating or significantly reducing their estate taxes. As a result of these legislative changes, trust instrument reliance …

Fiduciary Obligations And Aboriginal Peoples, Kent Mcneil

Articles & Book Chapters

No abstract provided.

Testamentary Incapacity, Undue Influence, And Insane Delusions, Thomas Simmons

Faculty Publications

Testamentary incapacity, undue influence, and insane delusions are recurring doctrines in the context of an impaired, weakened, or confused individual leaving a will, the validity of which comes under question. In the case of In re Estate of Berg the South Dakota Supreme Court, in 2010, held that an individual possessed testamentary capacity even where he suffered a static lifelong delusion about the identity of his father and was unable to articulate an accurate estimate of his net worth. This article uses Berg as a means of framing the requirements of a valid Last Will and Testament along with the …

Trust Term Extension: An Economic Analysis, Daniel B. Kelly

Journal Articles

To compete for trust assets following a change in the federal tax code, many states repealed or abrogated the Rule Against Perpetuities (RAP). By repealing the RAP, these states allow a settlor to create a trust that lasts forever: a “dynasty trust” or “perpetual trust.” In a thoughtful article, Trust Term Extension, Reid Kress Weisbord asks: “[C]ould the duration of a trust settled in a jurisdiction governed by the Rule Against Perpetuities be extended indefinitely after the jurisdiction’s repeal of the Rule Against Perpetuities?” While I believe that Weisbord is correct in the starting point of his analysis (the settlor's …

Publicity Rules For Public Trusts, Allison Anna Tait

Cardozo Arts & Entertainment Law Journal

That museums are public trusts is a truism in academic discourse and industry discussion. What various commentators mean when they speak about museums as public trusts, however, is less clear. This Article untangles and analyzes the various meanings of "'public trust" and how these meanings translate into regulatory systems. I propose that two predominant meanings-the public resource and trust law meanings-jointly constitute the definition of a public trust, and that each meaning has a consequent regulatory framework. These definitional and regulatory frameworks coexist without conflict in most contexts. In the context of deaccessioning, however, they collide.

Deaccessioning-the practice of a …

The Secret Economy Of Charitable Giving, Allison Anna Tait

Law Faculty Publications

Charitable giving is big business. In 2009, the Internal Revenue Service reported close to 100,000 private foundations, almost double the number from fifteen years earlier. Some of these charitable trusts, like the Gates Foundation, are multi-billion dollar enterprises. Trust instruments and other governing documents set forth the terms that control these gifts. Because charitable trusts can exist in perpetuity, however, changing circumstances sometimes render the terms difficult to fulfill. Courts can apply cy pres, a doctrine that allows for the modification of gift restrictions, but in the past courts have tended to apply cy pres narrowly and privilege donor intent …

Correcting The Record Regarding Therestatement Of Property’S Slayer Rulein The Brooklyn Law Review’Ssymposium Issue On Restatements, Lawrence W. Waggoner, John H. Langbein

Articles

In 2014, the Brooklyn Law Review published a symposium issue on Restatements of the Law. The organizer of the symposium, Professor Anita Bernstein, did not afford an opportunity for Restatement reporters to comment on the articles. The organizer did invite the Director of the American Law Institute, Lance Liebman, to contribute an essay commenting on the symposium as a whole. Liebman’s essay—unintentionally no doubt—misstated the position that we took in formulating the slayer rule for the Restatement (Third) of Property: Wills and Other Donative Transfers. Liebman’s misstatement—that we recommended that the Institute adopt a rule allowing a murderer to inherit …

The Testamentary Foundations Of Commercial Arbitration, Peter B. Rutledge

Scholarly Works

This Article offers the first systematic treatment of the relationship between commercial arbitration and testamentary arbitration. (By testamentary arbitration, I mean an arbitration clause contained in a will requiring beneficiaries to resolve differences over the estate by means of an enforceable decision by a private party rather than judicial resolution in a probate court.) Recent scholarship and jurisprudence have questioned the enforceability of these arrangements as incompatible with the requirement of a written "agreement" between parties to the arbitration. Contrary to these views, close examination of the historical record of testamentary arbitration leading to the Federal Arbitration Act's enactment reveals …

Publicity Rules For Public Trusts, Allison Anna Tait

Law Faculty Publications

That museums are public trusts is a truism in academic discourse and industry discussion. What various commentators mean when they speak about museums as public trusts, however, is less clear. This Article untangles and analyzes the various meanings of "'public trust" and how these meanings translate into regulatory systems. I propose that two predominant meanings-the public resource and trust law meanings-jointly constitute the definition of a public trust, and that each meaning has a consequent regulatory framework. These definitional and regulatory frameworks coexist without conflict in most contexts. In the context of deaccessioning,however, they collide.

Deaccessioning-the practice of a museum …

Trusts In Commerce: Guy Neale V Nine Squares Pty Ltd [2014] Sgca 64, Man Yip

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

In Guy Neale v Nine Squares Pty Ltd [2014] SGCA 64, the Court of Appealconsidered the operation of the express trust in the commercial context and theprinciples relating to the award of an institutional constructive trust for breachof fiduciary duty. The decision is interesting not only for the exposition of legalprinciples, but also because it relates to the posh restaurant-bar, “Ku De Ta”,located at Marina Bay Sands.

Merger Is Indirect Gift In Cavallaro, Kerry A. Ryan

All Faculty Scholarship

In Cavallaro v. Commissioner, the Tax Court held that a merger of two family-owned businesses resulted in a substantial taxable gift. The taxpayers avoided penalties by demonstrating that they relied in good faith on the mistaken advice of competent tax advisers.

Revisiting The Revolution: Reintegrating The Wealth Transmission System, Melanie B. Leslie, Stewart E. Sterk

Articles

Thirty years ago, John Langbein published "The Nonprobate Revolution and the Future of Succession." The article celebrated testators' newfound ability to avoid the expense and delay of the probate court system by holding assets in a variety of non-probate devices, such as retirement and bank accounts with beneficiary designations and revocable trusts. Langbein high-lighted problems the revolution might generate and predicted how they might be resolved. Since then, significant problems have indeed developed. First, wills law doctrines designed to effectuate intent of testators have not been universally extended to non-probate transfers. Second, the fragmentation of the wealth transmission process has …

Review: Compassionate Care For The Living And The Dying, Browne C. Lewis

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

This is a review of "The End of End-of Life Law" (92 N.C.L. Rev. 1693 (2014), by Lois L. Shepard. In light of medical advances and increasing health care costs, conversations about end-of-life care will continue to occur. A significant portion of the discussion will focus on ways to handle surrogate decision-making. The practical suggestions Professor Shepherd includes in her article could be a valuable part of that dialogue.