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property to the Foundation or the Trust or any other charity.
Instead, she left it all to her daughter. And this created the
first problem in this case, because charitable deductions are
allowed for the value of property in a decedent’s gross estate
only if transferred to a charitable donee “by the decedent during
his lifetime or by will.” Sec. 20.2055-1(a), Estate Tax Regs.
Courts have repeatedly declined to permit deductions where the
amount given to charity turned upon the actions of a decedent’s
beneficiary or an estate’s executor or administrator. See, e.g.,
Estate of Engelman v. Commissioner, 121 T.C. 54, 70-71 (2003).
And it was Hamilton--not Christiansen--who might be regarded as
transferring that property to the Foundation and Trust by
executing the disclaimer.
This means that we must turn to section 2518, the Code’s
section that governs transfers by disclaimer. Section 2518 is
important because a disclaimer that meets that section’s test
will cause the bequest to the disclaimant to be treated as if it
had never been made. Sec. 2518(a). Without this provision, the
Government might serve itself a second helping of tax by treating
the disclaimed property as if it went from the estate to the
disclaimant followed by a transfer from the disclaimant to
another recipient, thus potentially piling gift tax onto estate
tax. Walshire, 288 F.3d at 346.
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