60
Opinion of the Court
law Drye had, at his mother's death, a valuable, transferable, legally protected right to the property at issue. See 152 F. 3d, at 895 (although Code does not define "property" or "rights to property," appellate courts read those terms to encompass "state-law rights or interests that have pecuniary value and are transferable"). The court noted, for example, that a prospective heir may effectively assign his expectancy in an estate under Arkansas law, and the assignment will be enforced when the expectancy ripens into a present estate. See id., at 895-896 (citing several Arkansas Supreme Court decisions, including: Clark v. Rutherford, 227 Ark. 270, 270- 271, 298 S. W. 2d 327, 330 (1957); Bradley Lumber Co. of Ark. v. Burbridge, 213 Ark. 165, 172, 210 S. W. 2d 284, 288 (1948); Leggett v. Martin, 203 Ark. 88, 94, 156 S. W. 2d 71, 74-75 (1941)).7
Drye emphasizes his undoubted right under Arkansas law to disclaim the inheritance, see Ark. Code Ann. § 28-2-101 (1987), a right that is indeed personal and not marketable. See Brief for Petitioners 13 (right to disclaim is not transferable and has no pecuniary value). But Arkansas law primarily gave Drye a right of considerable value—the right either to inherit or to channel the inheritance to a close family member (the next lineal descendant). That right simply cannot be written off as a mere "personal right . . . to accept or reject [a] gift." Ibid.
In pressing the analogy to a rejected gift, Drye overlooks this crucial distinction. A donee who declines an inter vivos
7 In recognizing that state-law rights that have pecuniary value and are transferable fall within § 6321, we do not mean to suggest that transferability is essential to the existence of "property" or "rights to property" under that section. For example, although we do not here decide the matter, we note that an interest in a spendthrift trust has been held to constitute " 'property' for purposes of § 6321" even though the beneficiary may not transfer that interest to third parties. See Bank One, 80 F. 3d, at 176. Nor do we mean to suggest that an expectancy that has pecuniary value and is transferable under state law would fall within § 6321 prior to the time it ripens into a present estate.
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