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trusts to comply with the 1969 Act rules unless and until defects
were discovered by the Commissioner upon audit. The committee
reports accompanying Congress's enactment of the reformation
provisions of section 2055(e)(3) state as follows:
Congress first permitted reformation of charitable
remainder trusts in 1974 and since that time, the
Congress has extended the period for reformations
several times * * * . Even so, it has come to the
attention of the committee that there are still many
instruments providing for split-interest charitable
contributions which do not meet the requirements for
qualification under the rules of the Tax Reform Act of
1969. * * * In light of the repeated need to extend
the period to reform such governing instruments and the
fact that failure to meet the 1969 Act rules often
results in reduced amounts passing to charity, the
committee believes that a permanent rule permitting
reformation of split-interest charitable contributions
should be permitted as long as there are adequate
safeguards to avoid abuse.
Specifically, the committee is concerned that
governing instruments of charitable split-interest
trusts which evidenced no attempt to comply with the
1969 Act rules would be reformed only if the defects
are found upon audit by the Internal Revenue Service.
In order to prevent this from occurring, the committee
believes that, in order for a governing instrument of a
charitable split-interest contribution to be
reformable, either (1) the creator had to make a bona
fide attempt to comply with the 1969 Act rules or (2)
the taxpayer must initiate reformation proceedings
before the Internal Revenue Service could reasonably be
expected to begin an audit. * * * [H. Rept. 98-432
(Part 2), supra at 1516-1517; S. Rept. 98-169 (Vol. 1),
supra at 731-732.]
The committee reports go on to clarify what constitutes the
creator's "bona fide attempt to comply with the 1969 Act rules"
(as codified in section 2055(e)(3)(C)(ii)): "The governing
instrument evidences an intent to comply with the 1969 Act rules
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