Leonard v. Commissioner

4 T.C. 1271, 1945 U.S. Tax Ct. LEXIS 178
CourtUnited States Tax Court
DecidedApril 30, 1945
DocketDocket Nos. 555, 556, 578, 577, 579
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 4 T.C. 1271 (Leonard 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
Leonard v. Commissioner, 4 T.C. 1271, 1945 U.S. Tax Ct. LEXIS 178 (tax 1945).

Opinion

OPINION.

Black, Judge:

The only question remaining to our determination is whether the income of trusts No. 1 for the years 1938, 1939, and 1940 is taxable to the grantors thereof under section 22 (a), 166, or 167 of the Revenue Act of 1938 (as to the year 1938) and of the Internal Revenue Code (as to the years 1939 and 1940), or is taxable to the trusts under section 161 of the Revenue Act of 1938 and of the Internal Revenue Code; and whether the income of trusts No. 2 for the year 1940 is taxable to the grantors thereof under code section 22 (a), 166, or 167, or is taxable to the trusts under code section 161.

We shall consider first whether the income of the six trusts is taxable to the grantors thereof under section 22 (a). That section is so familiar that it need not here be quoted. The respondent contends that the income of the six trusts is taxable to the grantors thereof under section 22 (a) and relies principally upon Helvering v. Clifford, 309 U. S. 331, and similar cases following that decision which are in the margin.1

Petitioners contend that the income of the six trusts is not taxable to the grantors thereof under the doctrine of the Clifford case. The cases principally relied upon by petitioners are listed below.2

We find it unnecessary to discuss in detail all of the cited cases on this question, and it would be futile to do so. As was said in Miller v. Commissioner, 147 Fed. (2d) 189, affirming a memorandum opinion of this Court, “we have cited these few cases pro and con in support of the proposition that there are no precise standards or guides, either in the Act, regulations or decisions of the courts, by which our inquiry may be conducted. The cases cited do not complete the catalogue. Each case must rest upon its own peculiar facts and circumstances.” To the same effect see Herbert T. Cherry, supra. The Supreme Court in the Clifford case said that the “issue is whether the grantor after the trust has been established may still be treated, under this statutory scheme as the owner of the corpus,” and that, “In absence of more precise standards or guides supplied by statute or appropriate regulations, the answer to that question must depend on an analysis of the terms of the trust and all the circumstances attendant on its creation and operation.”

We do not think the grantors of the six trusts here involved may still be considered as the owners of the corpora of these trusts after the trusts were established. The trusts were irrevocable. They were for the benefit of the grantors’ three minor daughters. As each child attained the age of 30 years the entire trust estate in the 1938 trusts could be delivered to the respective beneficiary and the trust terminated. If not terminated at that time, termination was mandatory in the case of all six trusts upon the beneficiary reaching the age of 50, and in any event the six trusts were to terminate at the expiration of 20 years and 10 months after the death of the last to die of the three children beneficiaries living at the time the trusts were created. Upon the death of any original beneficiary before the termination of her trust, provision was made for the passage of the trust property to persons other than the grantors. The interests of the beneficiaries were vested. The grantors retained no power to alter or amend the trusts in any way. They reserved no power or right to direct that the income or principal of the trusts be paid to beneficiaries other than those named in the trusts. The trusts were administered strictly in accordance with their terms. Upon a careful analysis of the terms and circumstances attendant upon the creation and operation of the six trusts in question, it is our opinion that the cases relied upon by petitioners support their contention and are controlling, and that the income of the trusts is not taxable to the grantors under section 22 (a) and the doctrine of the Clifford case.

The respondent places considerable emphasis upon the circumstance that one of the grantors was the sole trustee during the taxable years in question. He argues that this factor brings the instant proceedings within the doctrine of Louis Stockstrom, supra. We think the instant case is distinguishable on its facts from the Stoohstrom case. In the Stoohstrom case the three trusts which were made for the settlor’s three adult children contained powers which enabled the settlor-trustee to shift income beneficiaries somewhat similar to the powers reserved to the grantor in Commissioner v. Buck, supra. There are no such powers granted to the settlor-trustees in the instant case. In the Stockstrom case the seven trusts which were set up for the benefit of Stockstrom’s seven grandchildren, while not granting to the settlor-trustee powers which were as extensive as those contained in the trusts for his three adult children, did grant to the settlor-trustee the discretion to either accumulate the income or distribute it to the beneficiary. These trusts were for the lifetime of the beneficiaries. We construed this power as being broad enough to enable the settlor-trustee to completely withhold the income of the trust from the grandchild primary beneficiary throughout his lifetime and thereby give it to the remaindermen. To quote from the opinion itself in the Stockstrom case, the settlor-trustee “was not required to distribute any part of the income to any of the beneficiaries during his lifetime.” We held that this power over the income, when coupled with the broad administrative powers granted the settlor-trustee over the corpus in these several trusts, caused the income to be taxable to the settlor, Stockstrom. This view was affirmed by the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals. See that court’s opinion in Stockstrom v. Commissioner, 148 Fed. (2d) 491.

In the instant proceedings Leonard had no powers to cause the shifting of income from one beneficiary to another such as were present in the Stockstrom or Buck cases. We think the trusts in the instant proceedings are similar in character to those which were present in such cases as Frederick Ayer, supra, and David Small, supra, in which we held that the income of the trusts was not taxable to the settlor in those cases under section 22 (a). In the Ayer case we quoted from Commissioner v. Branch, supra, as follows:

* * * Where the grantor has stripped himself of all command over the income for an indefinite period, and in all probability, under the terms of the trust instrument, will never regain beneficial ownership of the corpus, there seems to be no statutory basis for treating the income as that of the grantor under Section 22 (a) merely because he has made himself trustee with broad power in that capacity to manage the'trust estate. See Helvering v. Achelis, 112 F. (2d) 929. We do not read the dictum in Helvering v. Fuller, 310 U. S. 69, 76, as implying the contrary.

In cases like the present one Congress has provided for the taxation of the income of the trusts to the trustee under section 161. The trusts here involved have complied with those provisions of the law and have returned the income in question for taxation and have paid the tax thereon. We do not see where the law requires more. We hold, therefore, that petitioners in Docket Nos.

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Related

Hall v. Commissioner
150 F.2d 304 (Tenth Circuit, 1945)
Leonard v. Commissioner
4 T.C. 1271 (U.S. Tax Court, 1945)

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Bluebook (online)
4 T.C. 1271, 1945 U.S. Tax Ct. LEXIS 178, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/leonard-v-commissioner-tax-1945.