- 56 -
Labor, 62 F.3d 163, 165-166 (6th Cir. 1995) (courts must endeavor
to apply the plain meaning of a statute as ascertained through a
“straightforward” and “commonsense” approach). The Courts of
Appeals for the Eighth and Ninth Circuits rejected respondent’s
reading of the general rule to require that the transfer be
irrevocable on September 25, 1986, a reading also espoused by
respondent here and accepted by the Court’s opinion supra pp. 21
and 27-29, concluding instead that the general rule in TRA 1986
section 1433(b)(2)(A) plainly required that the trust be
irrevocable on that date. See Bachler v. United States, supra at
1080; Simpson v. United States, supra at 814. That conclusion is
supported by the “rule of the last antecedent”, under which the
clause “which was irrevocable on September 25, 1985” should be
construed to relate to the word “trust” and not to the word
“transfer”. See 2A Singer, Sutherland Statutory Construction,
sec. 47:33 (6th ed. 2000); see also Barnhart v. Thomas, 540 U.S.
20, 26 (2003). That conclusion also is supported by the fact
that Congress apparently drafted the general rule with a broad
and precise brush, providing explicitly that the GST “shall not
apply to * * * any generation-skipping transfer under a trust
which was irrevocable on September 25, 1985.” (Emphasis added.)
Accord Dixie Fuel Co. v. Commr. of Soc. Sec., supra at 1061
(noting that the “Supreme Court has held in any number of
contexts that ‘shall’ is ‘explicitly mandatory’ language”).
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