290
Thomas, J., dissenting
erty ownership that was of particular benefit to the stay-at-home spouse or mother. She is overwhelmingly likely to be the survivor that obtains title to the unencumbered property; and she (as opposed to her business-world husband) is overwhelmingly unlikely to be the source of the individual indebtedness against which a tenancy by the entirety protects. It is regrettable that the Court has eliminated a large part of this traditional protection retained by many States.
Justice Thomas, with whom Justice Stevens and Justice Scalia join, dissenting.
The Court today allows the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to reach proceeds from the sale of real property that did not belong to the taxpayer, respondent's husband, Don Craft,1 because, in the Court's view, he "possesse[d] individual rights in the [tenancy by the entirety] estate sufficient to constitute 'property' or 'rights to property' for the purposes of the lien" created by 26 U. S. C. § 6321. Ante, at 276. The Court does not contest that the tax liability the IRS seeks to satisfy is Mr. Craft's alone, and does not claim that, under Michigan law, real property held as a tenancy by the entirety belongs to either spouse individually. Nor does the Court
1 The Grand Rapids property was tenancy by the entirety property owned by Mr. and Mrs. Craft when the tax lien attached, but was conveyed by the Crafts to Mrs. Craft by quitclaim deed in 1989. That conveyance terminated the entirety estate. Mich. Comp. Laws Ann. § 557.101 (West 1988); see also United States v. Certain Real Property Located at 2525 Leroy Lane, 910 F. 2d 343, 351 (CA6 1990). The District Court and Court of Appeals both held that the transfer did not constitute a fraudulent conveyance, a ruling the Government has not appealed. The IRS is undoubtedly entitled to any proceeds that Mr. Craft received or to which he was entitled from the 1989 conveyance of the tenancy by the entirety property for $1; at that point the tenancy by the entirety estate was destroyed and at least half of the proceeds, or 50 cents, was "property" or "rights to property" "belonging to" Mr. Craft. By contrast, the proceeds that the IRS claims here are from Mrs. Craft's 1992 sale of the property to a third party. At the time of the sale, she owned the property in fee simple, and accordingly Mr. Craft neither received nor was entitled to these funds.
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