Barrett Timber & Dunnage Corp. v. Commissioner

29 T.C. 76, 1957 U.S. Tax Ct. LEXIS 61
CourtUnited States Tax Court
DecidedOctober 18, 1957
DocketDocket No. 60565
StatusPublished
Cited by10 cases

This text of 29 T.C. 76 (Barrett Timber & Dunnage Corp. v. Commissioner) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering United States Tax Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Barrett Timber & Dunnage Corp. v. Commissioner, 29 T.C. 76, 1957 U.S. Tax Ct. LEXIS 61 (tax 1957).

Opinion

OPINION.

Murdoch, Judge:

The Commissioner determined a deficiency in income and excess profits tax of the petitioner in the amount of $15,987.47 for its taxable year ended September 30, 1951. The only issue for decision is whether the Commissioner erred in disallowing a deduction of $20,108.29 claimed as a contribution to Barrett Timber and Dunnage Corporation Employees’ Pension Trust. The facts have been presented by a stipulation which is adopted as the findings of fact.

The petitioner was incorporated under the laws of New York in November 1944. It uses an accrual system of accounting and files Federal income tax returns on the basis of a fiscal year ending September 30.

Section 23 (p) applies specifically to contributions of an employer to an employees’ trust or annuity plan and provides in paragraph (1) that if contributions are paid by an employer to or under a pension plan such contributions “shall not be deductible under subsection (a) but shall be deductible, if deductible under subsection (a) without regard to this subsection, under this subsection but only to the following extent.” Following the words “to the following extent,” subparagraphs (A), (B), (C), and (D) provide limitations, one effect of which is to deny deduction of a liability incurred in the taxable year by an accrual basis taxpayer, even though it would have been deductible under section 23 (a), unless it is actually paid within the 60 days following the close of that year. Abingdon Potteries, Inc., 19 T. C. 23. Subparagraph (E) is as follows:

For the purposes of subparagraphs (A), (B), and (C), a taxpayer on the accrual basis shall be deemed to have made a payment on the last day of the year of accrual if the payment is on account of such taxable year and is made within sixty days after the close of the taxable year of accrual.

It is not necessary to consider any of these limiting provisions in this case unless the fiscal year ended September 30, 1951, was “the taxable year of accrual” of the $20,108.29, that is, unless it would have been deductible under section 23 (a) if subsection (p) could be disregarded. Thus, the first question here is whether the $20,108.29 contribution would have been deductible for the taxable year under section 23 (a) without regard to subsection (p) since only then does subsection (p) apply. Abingdon Potteries, Inc., supra.

The petitioner uses an accrual method of accounting and the $20,-108.29 would not be an allowable deduction for the taxable year ended September 30,1951, under subsection (a) unless the petitioner incurred the liability to pay it during that year. A liability is not incurred for tax purposes within a taxable year unless all of the events which fix the amount of the liability and the obligation of the taxpayer to pay it occurred in that year. United States v. Anderson, 269 U. S. 422.

A pension plan and trust agreement was submitted to the board of directors of the petitioner at a meeting on September 21, 1951, and a resolution was adopted at that meeting instructing the corporation to execute that pension plan and trust agreement. The resolution also provided that Max W. Goldberg be requested to accept appointment as trustee of the pension plan and trust agreement. Goldberg subsequently gave his consent at the same meeting.

“A resolution was unanimously adopted [at a meeting of the board of directors on September 25,1951] in which the corporation approved, adopted and ratified the provisions contained in an agreement entered into on September 21, 1951, between the corporation as an employer and Max W. Goldberg, C. P. A., as trustee under an employees pension plan and trust for the benefit of non-union employees of the corporation who are performing services in an executive capacity, and it was further resolved, Benjamin R. Kent, as vice president, Abraham Sadin as secretary were authorized and directed to execute the said agreements in three counterparts and to affix the seal of the corporation to each such counterpart.” The above was stipulated, but the record does not include a copy of • any “agreement entered into on September 21,1951” or later during the taxable year.

The petitioner, on November 27, 1951, delivered to Max W. Goldberg, trustee, a check for $21,111, representing the initial premium on the pension trust “adopted” at the directors’ meetings of September 21 and 25, 1951. The record does not show how the amount of that check was determined. Goldberg endorsed the check to the order of Connecticut General Life Insurance Company and delivered it to that company on November 27,1951.

The difference between the check for $21,111 and the $20,108.29 now claimed by the petitioner as a deduction was “disallowed as overstated” and the disallowance has been agreed to by the petitioner.

The president of the petitioner and Goldberg, as trustee, on December 1,1951, executed a “Pension Plan and Trust Agreement of Barrett Timber and Dunnage Corporation,” effective as of September 1,1951. The record does not show that any similar instrument was executed at any earlier date.

The instrument executed on December 1, 1951, appears to be the original agreement and provides on page 4 that “[t]he ‘trust agreement’ is this agreement, and if the same be amended,' this agreement as so amended.” A participant is defined therein as “a qualified employee who is eligible to be and becomes a participant as provided in Article V of this agreement,” and a pensioner is defined as “a participant who has been certified to the Trustee by the Pension Committee as one entitled to receive benefits hereunder.” The plan contemplates that a contract or contracts will be entered into with a life insurance company (unnamed) to provide some or all of the benefits.

The pension committee was vested with powers, inter alia, to determine all questions relating to the eligibility of employees to become participants, to compute and determine the amounts of contributions which must be made to the trust by the company in order to provide the benefits to which the participants and their beneficiaries are entitled, to appoint an actuary to make any actuarial or other computations required in the administration of the plan, and to make and publish such rules for the regulation of the trust as are not inconsistent with the terms of the agreement. The record does not show when the pension committee was appointed, when it began to function, when it published any rules, when it first determined the eligibility of any employee to become a participant, or when it computed and determined the amount of the first contribution to be made to the trust by the petitioner, or that any of those events occurred in the taxable year ended September 30,1951.

The agreement provides on page 9 that “[f]or every insurable participant there shall be obtained a contract providing for a death benefit,” and “[f]or every uninsurable participant there shall be obtained a contract for the same premium that would have been paid for life insurance at standard rates, providing for a death benefit,” each benefit being in the event of the participant’s death before his normal retirement date.

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Barrett Timber & Dunnage Corp. v. Commissioner
29 T.C. 76 (U.S. Tax Court, 1957)

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Bluebook (online)
29 T.C. 76, 1957 U.S. Tax Ct. LEXIS 61, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/barrett-timber-dunnage-corp-v-commissioner-tax-1957.