Commissioner of Internal Revenue v. James C. Senter and Susan B. Senter, Anthony Foster McKissick v. Commissioner of Internal Revenue

242 F.2d 400, 50 A.F.T.R. (P-H) 2003, 1957 U.S. App. LEXIS 5147
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit
DecidedMarch 11, 1957
Docket7331, 7332
StatusPublished
Cited by18 cases

This text of 242 F.2d 400 (Commissioner of Internal Revenue v. James C. Senter and Susan B. Senter, Anthony Foster McKissick v. Commissioner of Internal Revenue) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Commissioner of Internal Revenue v. James C. Senter and Susan B. Senter, Anthony Foster McKissick v. Commissioner of Internal Revenue, 242 F.2d 400, 50 A.F.T.R. (P-H) 2003, 1957 U.S. App. LEXIS 5147 (4th Cir. 1957).

Opinion

PARKER, Chief Judge.

These are appeals affecting the income tax liability of Anthony Foster McKissick and his former wife, now Susan B. Senter, for the tax year 1949. In that year, the sum of $43,485.27 was paid to Mrs. Senter, pursuant to a separation agreement. McKissick contends that this was a “periodic” support payment for which he was entitled to a deduction under section 23 (u) of the Revenue Code of 1939, 26 U.S.C.A. § 23(u). The Tax Court held that the amount was not taxable to Mrs. Senter as income under section 22 (k) and that he was not entitled to the deduction. McKissick has appealed from the decision against him and the Commissioner has taken a protective appeal in the case of Mrs. Senter, although contending that the decision of the Tax Court is correct in both cases.

The statutes applicable provide that periodic payments made to a wife who is divorced or legally separated from her husband under a divorce or separation agreement, shall be includible in the gross income of the wife and shall constitute a deduction for the husband. 1 *402 Under a separation agreement entered into in August 1948 McKissick assigned to his wife, for the support of herself and minor son, one-third of the amount that he was entitled to receive from the estates of his grandfather and grandmother, with a further agreement that if she should obtain a divorce and remarry he would pay her a cash sum equal to what she would be entitled to receive under the agreement for a three-year period. The provision with respect to the cash payment is as follows:

“(e) It is understood and agreed that the said payment of One-third (%) of said rents, issues and income shall cease and determine if and when the said Susan B. McKissick obtains a valid divorce and remarries. If she does secure a valid divorce and remarries, the said Anthony F. McKissick agrees to pay her in cash a sum equal to the total amount which the said Susan B. MeKissick has received or become entitled to receive from the aforesaid estates under this contract and agreement for the preceding three (3) years prior to the obtaining of such divorce and remarriage. In the event that the said Susan B. McKissick should obtain a valid divorce and remarry before she has received or become entitled to receive three (3) successive annual payments from said estates, the said Anthony F. McKissick agrees to pay her in cash a sum equal to three (3) times the average annual payments which the said Susan B. McKissick has received or has become entitled to receive from said two estates.”

The next paragraph of the agreement provides that, if Mrs. McKissick shall remarry after Mr. McKissick has obtained a divorce from her, “then the annual payments from the two trust estates * * shall cease and determine and the said Anthony F. McKissick hereby agrees to pay to the said Susan B. McKissick the cash settlement hereinabove referred to in the next preceding paragraph.” The paragraph following provides that, if Mrs. McKissick shall remarry after a divorce obtained either by her or Mr. McKissick, the latter will pay her “in addition to the cash settlement hereinabove provided for” the sum of $4,000 annually for the support of their infant son until he becomes twenty-one years of age.

*403 Mrs. McKissick secured a divorce and remarried in November 1949. Prior to that time she had received under the separation agreement sums of §7,500, §2,-221.03 and §4,774.06, and it is conceded that these sums were properly treated as “periodic” payments which were properly taxable to her as income and for which Mr. McKissick was entitled to a deduction. It was estimated that upon he? divorce and remarriage she was entitled to receive under the separation agreement a lump sum settlement of §43,485.27. This was paid to her and she executed a release to Mr. McKissick and the trustees of the estates from which payments had been made to her, releasing them from all further liability.

On these facts we think it clear, as found by the Tax Court, that the §43,-485.27 did not constitute a periodic payment for the support of the wife within the meaning of section 22(k) or 23(u), but that it constituted a lump sum settlement not taxable to the wife as income and not deductible from the income of the husband. The purpose of 22 (k) and 23 (u) was to provide for a division of the taxability of income where the income itself was divided between husband and wife pursuant to a divo me or separation agreement, not to tax or to grant deductions with respect to divisions or transfers of property made in final settlement of marital controversies. The difference between the “periodic” payments and the cash settlement here was well stated in the opinion of the Tax Court as follows:

“The first three payments made under covenant 3(a) were for the maintenance and support of the separated wife and for the maintenance, support, education, and care of the minor child. They were to be paid from the estates of the husband’s grandparents and under covenant 3 (c) were to be made at the time payments from such estates were to be made to the husband but in any event at least once each year. * * The payment of §43,485.27 made under covenant 3(e) was an entirely different kind of payment. Under that covenant, it was understood and agreed that the payments previously provided for from the estates of the husband’s grandparents ‘shall cease and determine if and when the said Susan B. McKissick obtains a valid divorce and remarries.’ The wife did both; she obtained a valid divorce and she remarried. Therefore, under covenant 3(e), her former husband became obligated to pay her ‘in cash a sum’ to be determined by means of the last sentence in covenant 3(e) ”.

The Tax Court in the prior case of Ralph Norton, 16 T.C. 1216, affirmed 8 Cir., 192 F.2d 960, a case involving an initial cash payment as well as subsequent “periodic” payments, had distinguished such cash payments from the “periodic’1, payments saying:

“The word ‘periodic’ is to be taken in its ordinary meaning and so considered excludes a payment not to be made at fixed intervals but in a lump sum, and the fact that the statute made particular reference to periodic payments is some reason to believe that another kind of payment, that is, an initial payment in some larger and undivided amount, was considered in a different category. We may, we think, take judicial notice that divorce settlements or decrees not uncommonly provide some considerable amount payable immediately to the wife, in addition to regular or recurring payments for current support thereafter. We consider it reasonable to believe that Congress had such a practice in mind and did not intend to make the wife taxable upon the lump sum, original, or principal payments to be made here, but that it was something in the nature of division of capital, rather than from the husband’s income so as to be deductible by him. At any rate, we think Congress failed to provide that such a payment was ‘periodic’ and that, therefore, it is not within the statute.” (Italics supplied).

*404 See also Baer v. Com’r, 16 T.C. 1418, affirmed 8 Cir., 196 F.2d 646; Haag v.

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242 F.2d 400, 50 A.F.T.R. (P-H) 2003, 1957 U.S. App. LEXIS 5147, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/commissioner-of-internal-revenue-v-james-c-senter-and-susan-b-senter-ca4-1957.