First National Bank of Atlanta v. United States
United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
634 F.2d 212 (1981)
- Written by Joe Cox, JD
Facts
Daniel McWhorter died in 1972. His will included several bequests and provided for the residue of his estate to be divided between a family trust and a marital trust. The will provided for dividing the residue evenly into the pools for the two trusts and provided for the marital-trust pool to include all property subject to a marital deduction. The will also stated that all estate taxes were to be paid from the residue of McWhorter’s estate. Ultimately, First National Bank of Atlanta (the bank) (plaintiff), the executor of the estate, filed an estate-tax return that calculated the marital deduction at one-half of the residue of the estate before the payment of estate taxes. The government (defendant) found that the deduction should have been one-half of the residue of the estate after the payment of estate taxes. The government issued a notice of deficiency for the difference, and the bank paid that tax, then sued for a refund. As a general rule, estate taxes were assessed before a spousal bequest, however, the court considered the specific terms of the will and whether it had prescribed a different mechanism for paying the funds in question.
Rule of Law
Issue
Holding and Reasoning (Per curiam)
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