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Wills, Trusts, and Estates in Focus, Second Edition

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Authors
  • Naomi R. Cahn
  • Alyssa DiRusso
  • Susan N. Gary
Series / Focus Casebook Series
BOOKMARK
Book length
632 pages
Publication Date
2025-02-01
Edition
Second Edition
Teaching Materials
NO
Description

Buy a new version of this textbook and receive access to the Connected eBook with Study Center on Casebook Connect, including lifetime access to the online ebook with highlight, annotation, and search capabilities. Access also includes practice questions, an outline tool, and other helpful resources. Connected eBooks provide what you need most to be successful in your law school classes.

In a Wills, Trusts, and Estates (WTE) class, there are students who plan to practice WTE (exclusively, or as part of a general practice), and those who need only master the general concepts to pass the bar exam. Wills, Trusts, and Estates in Focus, Second Edition, attends to the needs of both sets of students. For those who will practice in WTE, concepts are exemplified by realistic hypothetical scenarios that mirror practice and support the development of lawyering skills. For those who take WTE as a requisite course for the bar, the organization of text is keyed to the topics on the essay portion of the multi-state bar examination. Moreover, in the Second Edition, most problem sets now reflect the structure of the NextGen Bar's foundational skills requirements. (For example, one foundational skill is to “Identify which facts are likely to be relevant to or dispositive of a legal issue in a matter,” so some problems now prompt the student to similarly note the dispositive facts.)

Well-crafted pedagogy makes WTE concepts and procedure clear and accessible for all students. Straightforward exposition and examples support independent learning. Concisely edited cases are framed by Case Previews and Post-Case Follow-Ups that highlight the issue at hand, review the court’s decision, provide context, and prepare students to apply the relevant legal principles to the exercises that follow: Real Life Applications. Content summaries and problem sets at the end of each chapter enable students to review and assess their mastery of content.

New to the Second Edition
  • Expanded discussion of survival, with references to attempted updates to the Uniform Determination of Death Act
  • Enhanced coverage of tax values, including the future of estate tax in light of a 2025 end date for current estate tax provisions
  • Important updates to electronic wills, estate planning documents, and the current rules on remote witnessing and notarization
  • Major new cases, including
    • Reynolds v. Van Den Steene, addressing the requirement of capacity in will contests
    • Herbst v. Board of Regents of the University of Colorado, involving the issue of standing in the management of a charitable trust
    • Reece Trust v. Reece, concerning the interpretation of a standard to distribute property for a wife’s support
    • In re Trust Under Deed of Garrison, demonstrating how trusts can be reformed by unanimous consent
Professors and students will benefit from:
  • Insightful authorship from three widely respected academics, Naomi R. Cahn, Alyssa DiRusso, and Susan Gary, whose expertise in WTE extends to related areas such as family law, charities, elder law, and tax. All are elected Fellows of the American College of Trust and Estate Counsel (ACTEC), the leading professional organization of trust and estates attorneys.
  • A consciously modern approach that balances landmark decisions, contemporary cases, and important timely developments in the law
  • Coverage, writing, and pedagogy that promotes learning outcomes and competencies
    • Knowledge and understanding of substantive and procedural WTE law
    • Legal analysis, reasoning, and problem-solving skills
    • A WTE lawyer's professional and ethical responsibilities 
  • Research and drafting exercises develop practice-based skills
  • Examples in the Appendix of how doctrine maps onto practice, as in will contest pleadings and probate filings
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About the authors
Naomi R. Cahn
John Theodore Fey Research Professor of Law
George Washington University

Education

  • A.B., Princeton University

  • J.D., Columbia University

  • LL.M., Georgetown University

Background

Naomi Cahn is the Harold H. Greene Professor of Law at The George Washington University Law School. She has written numerous law review articles on elder law, family law, feminist jurisprudence, and trusts and estates. She has also authored or co-authored books, including the forthcoming Homeward Bound: Modern Families, Elder Care, and Loss (Oxford University Press 2017, with Amy Ziettlow). Marriage Markets (Oxford University Press 2014, with June Carbone) was named as one of the best books of 2014 by both The Economist and Newsweek.

Cahn served as the Reporter for the Uniform Law Commission's Uniform Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act Revised (2015), which has now been adopted in more than a dozen states. She received her LL.M. from Georgetown University Law Center, her J.D. from Columbia Law School, and her A.B. from the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University.

At GW Law, she teaches courses on elder law, family law, trusts and estates, and child, family, and state.

Selected Books

  • The New Kinship

    . NYU Press, 2013.

  • (With Carbone, June.)

    Red Families v. Blue Families: Legal Polarization and the Creation of Culture

    . Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010.

  • (With Douglas E. Abrams, Catherine J. Ross, & David D. Meyer).

    Contemporary Family Law

    . 2nd ed. St. Paul: ThomsonWest, 2015. First edition published in 2006.

  • Test Tube Families: Why the Fertility Market Needs Legal Regulations

    . New York: New York University Press, 2009.

(With Hollinger, Joan Heifetz). Families by Law: An Adoption Reader. New York: New York University Press, 2004.

Susan N. Gary
Orlando J. and Marian H. Hollis Professor
University of Oregon

Susan Gary is the Orlando J. and Marian H. Hollis Professor of Law at the University of Oregon School of Law. Prior to joining the faculty, she practiced estate planning and advised charitable organizations at Mayer, Brown & Platt (now Mayer Brown LLP) in Chicago and worked in international taxation at DeBandt, van Hecke, and Lagae in Brussels. Her research examines the regulation of charities, fiduciary duties and the prudent investor rule, the definition of family for inheritance purposes, donor intent in connection with restricted charitable gifts, and the use of mediation in estate planning and probate.

She is a Trustee of the University of Oregon Board of Trustees, an Academic Fellow and former Regent of the American College of Trust and Estate Counsel, and a member of the Oregon Law Commission. She has been a member of the Council of the Real Property, Trust and Estate Section of the ABA and chair of the Estate Planning and Administration Section of the Oregon State Bar. Prof. Gary served as Reporter for the Drafting Committees of the Uniform Law Commission that developed the Uniform Prudent Management of Institutional Funds Act (UPMIFA) and the Model Protection of Charitable Assets Act.

Books • Mediation for Estate Planners: Managing Family Conflict, editor and chapter author (American Bar Association: 2016). • Bogert’s Law of Trusts and Trustees, §§ 321-352 (2d ed. revised) (2015).

Articles • Values and Value: University Endowments, Fiduciary Duties, and ESG Investing, 42 The Journal of College and University Law 247 (2016). • Definitions of Children and Descendants: Construing and Drafting Wills and Trust Instruments, 5 Texas Tech Estate Planning and Community Property Law Journal 283 (2013). • The Probate Definition of Family: A Proposal for Guided Discretion in Intestacy, 45 Mich. J. of L. Reform (2012). • Is It Prudent to be Responsible: The Legal Rules for Charities that Engage in Socially Responsible Investing and Mission Investing, 6 Nw. J.L. & Soc. Pol'y 106 (2011). • The Problems with Donor Intent: Interpretation, Enforcement, and Doing the Right Thing, 85 Chicago-Kent L. Rev. 977 (2010). • We Are Family: The Definition of Parent and Child for Succession Purposes, 34 ACTEC Journal 171 (2008). • Charities, Endowments, and Donor Intent: The Uniform Management of Institutional Funds Act, 41 Georgia L. Rev. 1277 (2007). • Transfer-on-Death Deeds: The Nonprobate Revolution Continues, 41 Real Prop., Prob. & Trust J. 529 (2007).
Product Information
Edition
Second Edition
Publication date
2025-02-01
Copyright Year
2025
Pages
632
Connected eBook with Study Center + Hardcover
9781543859164
Connected eBook (Digital Only)
9798892071819
Subject
Wills, Trusts, and Estates
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