Estate of Davison v. United States

155 Ct. Cl. 290
CourtUnited States Court of Claims
DecidedJuly 19, 1961
DocketNo. 335-58
StatusPublished
Cited by10 cases

This text of 155 Ct. Cl. 290 (Estate of Davison v. United States) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering United States Court of Claims primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Estate of Davison v. United States, 155 Ct. Cl. 290 (cc 1961).

Opinion

JoNes, Chief Judge,

delivered the opinion of the court:

This is a suit for the refund of Federal income taxes which were paid by the estate of Helen Davison for the years 1953 and 1951. The case concerns certain cash rents which were based on the proceeds of crop production on decedent’s land and certain other rents payable in crops which were attributable to leases that ran during the year 1952. On the date of decedent’s death the amounts of these rents were not ascertained. Thereafter, the estate collected both rents in full and sold the crop-rents for money. The questions presented are whether the rents received in money and the rents received in crops are taxable to the estate as income in respect of a decedent.

The facts have been found by the trial commissioner without exception by either party. The decedent, Helen Davison, was on the cash receipts and disbursements method of accounting. She died on December 24, 1952, owning two parcels of real property. One parcel, 320 acres located in Coolidge, Arizona (hereafter referred to as the Coolidge tract), had been leased by the decedent to one Fred Jones for the period January 1, 1952, to January 1, 1953. The lease provided that the decedent was to be paid as rent “one-fourth of all crops grown” on the 320 acres.

The second parcel of land, 640 acres located in Eloy, Arizona (hereafter referred to as the Eloy tract), had been leased to one Leland Jones and one Mike Jones who later assigned the lease to the Jones Ranch Enterprises Corporation. The term of this lease was from February 1952, to [293]*293January 1, 1953. It was provided in this lease that the decedent was to be paid as rent “one-half of the net proceeds of all crops grown” on the 640 acres. Each of the leases contained the customary provision that the tenant had the privilege of harvesting the balance of any crops that had not been harvested on the date of the expiration of the lease.

• Up to the date of decedent’s death, the local cotton gin company, on behalf of the lessees of the Coolidge tract and pursuant to that lease, had paid the decedent a total of $6,516.01 as her share of the seed credits and cotton sales for the period May 31, 1952, to October 20, 1952. This amount represented the proceeds from the sale of the decedent’s one-fourth of 129 bales of cotton grown by the lessee.

In February 1953, subsequent to the death of the decedent, the cotton gin company, again on behalf of the lessee of the Coolidge tract, paid the decedent’s estate the amount of $14,137.14, representing the sale price of decedent’s final share of the crops.

The lessee of the 640-acre Eloy tract had made no payments to the decedent prior to her death. But in 1953 the corporation leasing the tract filed two interim statements of settlement for rent due to the decedent’s estate. Both of these statements were rejected by the estate. On January 24, 1954, a settlement was reached between the lessee of the Eloy tract and the estate. It was agreed that the amount of rent due, pursuant to the terms of the lease agreement, was $14,429.43. Between January 27 and February 2, 1954, the estate received this sum from the lessee corporation.

Both the $14,138.14 Coolidge tract rent payment received by the estate in 1953 and the $14,429.43 Eloy tract rent payment received by the estate in 1954 were included as a part of the gross estate of the decedent in Schedule F of the Federal estate tax return filed by the estate. Neither of these two sums was reported as income to the estate. The Commissioner of Internal Revenue adjusted the estate’s income tax return to show each of these amounts received as income in respect of a decedent, and notified the estate that as a result of this adjustment the estate was subject to additional income taxes in the total amount of $11,892.11 plus deficiency [294]*294interest. The estate was given credit against this additional income tax liability for the estate taxes paid as a result of the inclusion of the rent payments as part of the decedent’s gross estate.

The taxpayer paid the asserted deficiency and filed timely claims for refund of income taxes for the periods 1953 and 1954 in the total amount of $13,728.28. The claims for refund were disallowed and this suit resulted.

The plaintiff maintains that the right to receive these two rental payments was part of the property of the decedent’s gross estate. As such it was properly valued and taxed under the estate tax provisions. The result was that this much of decedent’s property received a new basis in the hands of the estate equal to its estate tax valuation. Since the estate received in satisfaction of these claims for rent an amount which did not exceed the basis of the claims it cannot be said that the estate has received income.

The defendant maintains that the rents received by the estate in cash and in crops, which were immediately sold for its account, represent income in respect of a decedent as set forth in section 126' of the 1939 Internal Revenue Code, 26 IT.S.C. (I.R.C. 1939) §126 (1952 ed.), and section 691 of the 1954 Internal Revenue Code, 26 U.S.C. (I.R.C. 1954) §691 (1952 ed. supp. III). The plaintiff is therefore entitled to a credit for the estate taxes paid on the assessed value of the claims for rent, but the plaintiff is liable for ordinary income taxes on the amounts of rent actually collected.

As set forth above, we must determine whether these rents, both cash and crops, were properly taxed to the estate as income in respect of a decedent.

In order to understand the present state of the law some consideration must be given to its historical background. Prior to 1934 it was held by the courts under the then existing revenue statutes that money earned by a cash method taxpayer and accruable to him on the date of his death but which had not been received by him prior to his death could be collected by his estate without liability for income taxes. Such items were subject to death taxes but they escaped income taxes. Nichols v. United States, 64 Ct. Cl. 241 (1927). [295]*295A taxpayer on the accrual method of accounting was required to pay income taxes both on what he received and what was accruable to him on the date of his death. This interpretation of the law produced obvious inequities between those who were on the accrual method and those who were on the cash method. In addition, sizable amounts of income which were not “accruable” as the term was then used escaped taxation. Held v. Commissioner, 3 B.T.A. 408 (1926).

The Congress expressed concern over this discrimination and loss of revenue. See Sen. Eep. No. 4558, 73d Cong., 2d Sess. 28 (1934). It provided in section 42 of the Revenue Act of 1934 that the last return of every decedent should include “amounts accrued up to the date of his death.” 48 Stat. 680, 694. While this provision effected an equality between decedents on the cash and accrual methods of accounting, it often resulted in pyramiding into the decedent’s final return large amounts of income which except for death would have been spread over a number of years and subjected to lower rates of tax. See Sen. Rep. No. 1631, 77th Cong., 2d Sess. 100 (1942). In addition, the Supreme Court in Helvering v. Estate of Enright, 312 U.S. 636

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