Wills, Trusts & Estates Prof Blog

Call For Papers: ACTEC Law Journal -- Privacy in the Probate Field

The American College of Trust and Estate Counsel announces a Call For Papers on the following topic:

With increasing public attention focused on protecting our privacy, the practice and study of trusts and estates has been profoundly affected by a series of issues concerning the safeguarding of private information. Estate planners and law school professors have become more likely to consider a multitude of issues relating to privacy rights. 

A special issue of the ACTEC Law Journal will be devoted to a discussion of the intersection of Trusts and Estates and privacy issues and will be comprised of brief articles (3,000 word maximum). The conception of privacy issues is broad and intended to encompass all relevant matters of legal concern that a trusts and estates lawyer or professor might address. Suggested topics include silent trusts, taxation of privacy rights, corporate transparency and the impact on disclosure of ownership rights, identity confidentiality, incapacity planning to avoid a conservatorship, planning for public figures, and classic core trusts and estates topics like wills, trusts, intestacy, probate administration, and nonprobate transfers. 

Procedure for proposals: Authors wishing to contribute to this special volume should send a brief proposal of 250-300 words to Professor Naomi Cahn, Associate Editor, ACTEC Law Journal, at [email protected]. Please include “ACTEC Privacy Issues” in the subject line of your e-mail.

Proposals are due by April 4, 2022, and decisions will be made by the beginning of May.  Early submissions are encouraged as proposals will be reviewed on a rolling basis.  Given the brevity of each article, articles that delve into one or two topics in detail will normally be preferred over more general articles. We encourage submissions by authors from a variety of backgrounds, including those actively involved in fiduciary administration or the practice of law.

Final articles will be due by August 1, 2022 and will be published in the ACTEC Law Journal, Volume 48, Issue 1.

Call For Papers: ACTEC Law Journal Modernizing Trusts and Estates

Call For Papers: ACTEC Law Journal Modernizing Trusts and Estates

The American College of Trust and Estate Counsel announces a Call For Papers on the following topic:

As trusts and estates academics and practitioners look forward into the remainder of the 21^st century, we acknowledge the aspects of law and practice that are changing, that should change, and that should resist change.

A special issue of the ACTEC Law Journal will be devoted to a discussion of the topic of Modernizing Trusts and Estates and will be comprised of shorter articles (2,500-5,000 words).  The issue will focus on what matters are of most importance to the forward-looking trusts and estates professional.  Topics may include developments in tax law, adaptations in legal technology, racial justice and diversity, new or impending statutory reform, remote or electronic estate planning documents, the funeral and death industry, and other topics that demonstrate the way in which the trusts and estates landscape is shifting.

Procedure for proposals: Authors wishing to contribute to this special volume should send a brief proposal with estimated word count to Professor Alyssa A. DiRusso, Editor, ACTEC Law Journal, at [email protected].  Please include “ACTEC Theme Volume” in the subject line of your e-mail.

Proposals are due by March 15, 2021 and authors will be notified whether their article has been selected for publication by April 1, 2021.  Given the brevity of each article, articles that delve into one or two topics in detail will normally be preferred over more general articles. We encourage submissions by authors from a variety of backgrounds, including those actively involved in fiduciary administration or the practice of law.

Final articles will be due no later than August 1, 2021, and earlier submissions are welcome. Selected articles will be published in the ACTEC Law Journal, Volume 47 Issue 1, with an anticipated publication date of December 2021.

OSU can lead the way in ending diversion of dollars from scholarship endowments to entertain rich alums: David Marburger and Jeffrey Moritz

Ohio State University has dealt with a lot in the wake of COVID-19. The football season has been cancelled and brought back, they have had to deal with COVID-10 on campus and have even dealt with a $250 million cut in the operating budget. These obstacles have not been easy to overcome for the new president, Kristina Johnson. 

Another obstacle that has been lingering in the shadows is that Ohio State University has been spending millions of dollars that come from privately funded endowments. Due to this massive expenditure, a slew of students are paying for tuition that "private benefactors already have supplied the money to pay." 

An endowment is essentially a lump sum payment from a wealthy alum to a university. In exchange for the endowment, the university commits to spend the funds on a specific cause. 

The universities will invest the payment on order to preserve the original sum (the corpus) allowing the payment to continually generate money for scholarships. 

Sounds reasonable right? Well unfortunately, this is not always what happens. Jeff Moritz discovered that his deceased fathers endowment to Ohio State University was "sinking." Moritz retained an attorney to investigate the blunder and hopefully rectify it.

After studying hundreds of pages of public records, it was found that "nearly half of Ohio State University's 300 largest privately funded endowments established over the last 30 years are underwater." 

After Ohio State University was put on notice about this terror, they removed the link on its website allowing the public to review such records, stating that the removal of the link was due to "maintenance." 

However, it appears that unchecked spending is the actual problem.

See OSU can lead the way in ending diversion of dollars from scholarship endowments to entertain rich alums: David Marburger and Jeffrey Moritz, Cleveland.com, November 22, 2020. 

Special thanks to Susan N. Gary (University of Oregon School of Law) for bringing this article to my attention. 

Stetson’s Journal of Aging Law & Policy Call for Papers

The below announcement is posted as a courtesy for Prof. Rebecca Morgan, Stetson University School of Law:

Stetson’s Journal of Aging Law & Policy, the preeminent journal for cutting-edge issues of national and international aging law and policy, is seeking articles for its Volume 13, which will be published in May 2022. Stetson’s Journal of Aging Law & Policy is a unique journal with an elder law emphasis that also focuses on both law and policy.

If you are interested in submitting an article for publication, please email Nicholas Marler, Managing Editor, at [email protected].

Submission requirements: Articles must be in 12-point font and double spaced. Citations should be in accordance with either the ALWD or BlueBook citation manuals and the article must be related to a relevant elder law topic. Submission preferences: The Journal seeks articles that are between 10,000 and 20,000 words. However, consideration may be given to articles that fall outside of this word requirement.

Questions should be directed to Nicholas Marler, Managing Editor, at [email protected].

Yale Law Journal Seeks Articles & Essays

I am posting the below as a courtesy to Jenny Choi:

My name is Jenny Choi and I am the current Executive Editor for Articles & Essays at the Yale Law Journal.  We are writing to share with you that our deadline for Articles & Essays submissions is September 23, 2020 (this Wednesday), and to ask [you] to publicize the date to fellow scholars and colleagues.  As always, we are eager to consider exciting legal scholarship across the nation, and would be grateful for your help in getting the word out.  Here is the tweet we put out about our Wednesday deadline.

Call For Papers: AALS Intersectionality, Aging, and the Law

Call For Papers: AALS Section On Aging 2021 Annual Meeting program, co-sponsored by the Sections on Civil Rights, Disability Law, Family & Juvenile Law, Minority Groups, Poverty, Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Issues, Trusts and Estates, and Women in Legal Education  

 Intersectionality, Aging, and the Law

The AALS Section on Aging will focus its 2021 annual meeting program on intersectionality and aging.  We are interested in participants who will address this subject from numerous perspectives. Potential topics include gray divorce, incarceration, elder abuse (physical or financial), disparities in wealth, health, housing, and planning based on race or gender or gender identity, age and disability discrimination, and other topics.  The conception of the program is broad, and we are exploring publication options.

If you are interested in participating, please send a 400-600 word description of what you'd like to discuss.  Submissions should be sent to Professor Naomi Cahn, [email protected], by June 2, 2020, and the author[s] of the selected paper(s) will be notified by July 1, 2020.  

The Call for Paper presenters will be responsible for paying their registration fee and hotel and travel expenses.  Please note that AALS anticipates that the Annual Meeting will go forward (https://am.aals.org/), and the theme is The Power of Words.

Call for Papers for the Journal of Elder Policy, 2021 Special Issue

Protecting Older Adults During a Pandemic: Challenges and Opportunities for Societies

Editor-in-Chief: Eva Kahana PhD
Distinguished University Professor, Case Western Reserve University

Abstracts of 500 words are due by June 15, 2020.

Full papers (8,000 -10,000 words) due by September 30, 2020.

As we all process our new reality of coping with and surviving an on-going global pandemic, it is important that we focus on what can be done to protect older adults and what we can learn from the spread of this contagion.

Older adults, particularly those with underlying health conditions and/or disabilities are particularly at risk from the novel COVID-19. Not only are they more likely to develop severe complications if exposed to the virus, but they are also made more vulnerable by things such as social isolation (whether in their homes or in an institution), inability to access groceries and medications, and simply ageism. Indeed, many people were not taking the virus seriously at first since it seemed to only severely impact the health of older adults.

To address these important issues, the Journal of Elder Policy is issuing a call for papers that address policy challenges and implications related to COVID-19 and older adults. We welcome both empirical and conceptual papers from diverse disciplines. We seek papers that employ policy approaches to illustrate how the rise of coronavirus impacts older adults.  We are also eager to hear from scholars across the world facing unique challenges in their own countries.

Topics may include but are not limited to:

• Risk assessment, Ageism, Legislation to protect older adults,
• Community initiatives, Medical and nursing perspectives,
• Mental health challenges for elders, Family support or conflict,
• Helping and volunteering, Rationing of care, Challenges for caregivers

Authors should send their Vita and a 500 word abstract related to their paper by June 15 to Managing Assistant Editor, Kaitlyn Langendoerfer ([email protected])

All articles will be peer reviewed.

Call For Papers: ACTEC Law Journal -- Elder Law

The American College of Trust and Estate Counsel announces a Call For Papers on the following topic:

With an aging generation of Boomers and increasing estate tax exemptions, the practice and study of trusts and estates may be driven less by tax planning and more by a host of other issues confronting an older population. Those issues may be broadly grouped under the term "Elder Law."

A special issue of the ACTEC Law Journal will be devoted to a discussion of the intersection of Trusts and Estates and Elder Law and will be comprised of brief articles (2,000 word maximum). The conception of Elder Law is broad and intended to encompass all matters of legal concern that a trusts and estates lawyer might address for an aging client – or a client who is concerned about aging. Suggested topics include retirement planning, financial planning and wealth management, guardianship, disability and medical care, end-of-life planning, incapacity, powers of attorney, health care proxies, nursing homes and long-term care planning, special needs trusts, Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, elder abuse (physical or financial), age discrimination, family succession planning, grandparent visitation rights, and classic core trusts and estates topics like wills, trusts, intestacy, probate administration, and nonprobate transfers.

Procedure for proposals: Authors wishing to contribute to this special volume should send a brief proposal to Professor Alyssa A. DiRusso, Editor, ACTEC Law Journal, at [email protected]. Please include “ACTEC Elder Law” in the subject line of your e-mail.

Proposals are due by April 1, 2020. Early submissions are encouraged as proposals will be reviewed on a rolling basis. Given the brevity of each article, articles that delve into one or two topics in detail will normally be preferred over more general articles. We encourage submissions by authors from a variety of backgrounds, including those actively involved in fiduciary administration or the practice of law.

Final articles will be due by August 1, 2020 and will be published in the ACTEC Law Journal, Volume 46 Issue 1.

Call for Papers: Empirical Analysis of Wealth Transfer Law

The University of California, Davis School of Law (King Hall) and The American College of Trust and Estate Counsel’s Legal Education Committee are happy to announce that the 8th ACTEC academic symposium will be held on Friday, October 11, 2019. The theme is Empirical Analysis of Wealth Transfer Law.

The event’s goals are to bring together established and emerging scholars and to foster discussion about empirical scholarship about wills, nonprobate transfers, intestacy, inheritance taxation, and related issues. Articles presented at the symposium will consist of those selected from this Call for Papers and those from invited speakers. All papers will be published by the UC Davis Law Review.

If you would like to be considered to present a paper, please email an abstract of no more than two pages toProfessor David Horton ([email protected]) by March 1, 2019. The Law Review will notify those selected by March 15, 2019. Please be aware that speakers must submit drafts that are ready for the editing stage of the production process by mid-November 2019.

Speakers will be reimbursed for their reasonable travel expenses (economy airfare, ground transportation, and up to two nights in a local hotel). Speakers will also be invited to dinner on Friday, October 11. Breakfast and lunch will be provided to speakers and attendees on October 11 courtesy of the ACTEC Foundation. Questions about the symposium or this Call for Papers should be directed to David at the email address above or Professor Adam Hirsch ([email protected]).

Apollo's Marc Rowan Gives Wharton $50 Million for Professorships

Co-founder of Apollo Global Management LLC, Marc Rowan, is chair of Wharton’s Board of Overseers and co-chair of the More Than Ever campaign, the coalition of the elite that has a philanthropic goal of a billion dollars. Now Rowan will go down as giving Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania its largest donation to date: $50 million. The funds will be used to recruit three Rowan Distinguished Professors, appoint Rowan Fellows, and support the Penn Wharton Business Model. Rowan received both his undergraduate as well his MBA degrees from the University of Pennsylvania.

The gift surpasses the $40 million given by Jon Huntsman Sr. and family in 1998.

See Amanda L. Gordon, Apollo's Marc Rowan Gives Wharton $50 Million for Professorships, Bloomberg, October 2, 2018.

Special thanks to Jim Hillhouse (Professional Legal Marketing (PLM, Inc.) for bringing this article to my attention.