TaxProf Blog

Gabilondo Named One of 50 Most Influential Minority Law Professors

José Gabilondo (Florida International) is the only Tax Prof named to Lawyers of Color's 2013 50 Under 50 List ("The Most Influential Minority Law Professors 50 Years of Age or Younger") in its Law School Diversity Issue:

José Gabilondo joined the College of Law after working in financial market regulation at the U.S. Department of the Treasury, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, and the World Bank. He served as Associate Dean for Academic Affairs from 2009-2011. Professor Gabilondo teaches tax and corporate finance. He is co-author of Corporate Finance Debt, Equity, and Derivatives Markets and their Intermediaries in the American Casebook Series. He is a nationally recognized commentator in the Spanish-language media on financial and economic matters.

For the complete list of the 50 Under 50, see here.

CTJ: Ten Reasons Why We Need Corporate Tax Reform

Citizens for Tax Justice, Ten (of Many) Reasons Why We Need Corporate Tax Reform:

This CTJ report illustrates how profitable Fortune 500 companies in a range of sectors of the U.S. economy have been remarkably successful in manipulating the tax system to avoid paying even a dime of tax on billions of dollars in profits. These ten corporations’ tax situations shed light on the widespread nature of corporate tax avoidance. As a group, the ten companies paid no federal income tax on $16 billion in profits in 2012, and they paid zero federal income tax on $57 billion in profits over the past five years. All but one paid less than zero federal income tax in 2012; all paid exceedingly low rates over five years.

Tax Prof Wedding: Susannah Camic

Tax Prof Susannah Camic (Wisconsin) married Alex Tahk on September 22. The happy couple reports:

Alex and I met at UW-Madison's welcome reception for new faculty two years ago. Our academic interests are the converse of each others'. Alex is in the political science department, but spent a year in law school and works on judicial politics. I am of course at UW Law School, but spent a year in a political science Ph.D program and work on the politics of tax policy. We got married at Blessed Sacrament Catholic Church in Madison, followed by a reception at a restaurant called the Old Feed Mill.

Attending the wedding were tax lawyers Bob Fahrenbach, Jeanne Fahrenbach, Melissa Galetto, Brian Jenn, Kristin Keeling and Laura Leitch; non-tax lawprofs Lisa Alexander, Ann Althouse, Rob Anderson, Steve Barkan, Tonya Brito, Andy Coan, Anuj Desai, Alex Huneeus, Cecelia Klingele, Michele LaVigne, Ion Meyn, Thomas Mitchell, John Ohensorge, Margaret Raymond, Joel Rogers, David Schwartz, Mitra Sharafi, Mark Sidel, Steph Tai, Bill Whitford and Jason Yackee; and political science profs John Ahlquist, Rick Avramenko, Rikhil Bhavnani, Barry Burden, John Coleman, Mark Copelovitch, Scott Gehlbach, Eunsook Jung, Dan Kapust, Helen Kinsella, Alex Kuo, Melanie Manion, Ken Mayer, Ryan Owens, Maggie Peters, Jon Pevehouse, Byron Shafer, Nadav Shelef, Scott Straus, Kathy Cramer Walsh, Jessica Weeks, David Weimer and Susan Yackee.

Staudt Named Academic Director of USC Schwarzenegger Institute for State and Global Policy

Nancy Staudt, Edward G. Lewis Professor in Law and Public Policy at USC, has been named Academic Director of the new Schwarzenegger Institute for State and Global Policy:

The USC Schwarzenegger Institute will focus on the responsibility of policymakers to transcend partisanship to implement policies that most benefit the people they serve, with five priority areas: education, energy and environment, fiscal and economic policy, health and human wellness, and political reform. Guiding principles include: science and evidence as an important role to play when finding solutions to policy and social issues; local solutions are often the best means to solve global problems and, future leaders, including students and young people, must help shape the solutions for our future.

Schwarzenegger will chair the Board of Advisors and serve as inaugural holder of the Governor Downey Professor of State and Global Policy at USC, named after a former California governor and co-founder of USC.

The USC Schwarzenegger Institute will focus on the responsibility of leaders to transcend partisanship to implement policies that most benefit the people they serve. ... Guiding principles include: science and evidence must play an important role when finding solutions to policy and social issues; local solutions are often the best means to solve global problems; and future leaders, including students and young people, must help shape the solutions for our future.

Southern Federal Tax Institute Offers to Comp Tax Profs

The Board of Trustees of the Southern Federal Tax Institute invites all full-time tax professors to attend the Forty-Seventh Annual Institute in Atlanta on October 15-19, 2012, as guests of the Trustees (the $995 registration fee will be waived). If you would like to attend, please email here.  If you have any other questions, please contact Brant Hellwig (Washington & Lee), who serves as Special Advisor to the Institute.

Nancy Staudt Installed as Edward G. Lewis Chair in Law and Public Policy at USC

Tax Prof Nancy Staudt was installed on Monday as the inaugural holder of the Edward G. Lewis Chair in Law and Public Policy at USC:

Staudt, a nationally recognized tax scholar, began her career as a lawyer in San Francisco. She served as a professor at Northwestern University Law School until she came to USC in June 2011. She currently has faculty appointments in the Gould School of Law and the Sol Price School of Public Policy.

Staudt has enjoyed her experience so far at USC, especially working with students and her colleagues, she said. “The faculties in both these schools are just so smart and collegial,” Staudt said. “It really makes for a bright and vibrant experience. I teach both law students and undergraduate students as well and the students are so interested and interesting, so spending time with the faculty and students has been wonderful.”

The endowed chair not only reflects her achievements, but also the caliber of the university, Staudt said. “What’s exciting about [becoming a chair] is that only really great universities award these types of honors,” Staudt said. “It’s an exciting moment because USC is really becoming so fantastic and to be recognized at such a fantastic institution is a real honor.”

Stadut said one of her principal goals is to improve the university through the Lewis Chair. “I’ve really been thinking about this award as not only a motivator to work hard in the classroom and as a researcher, but as a responsibility to contribute to the school and the students,” Staudt said. “Not only do I get to glow in this new status, but I really need to be motivated to help this university become even greater.”

Welcome to the Tax Prof Blogosphere: Allison Christians

Tax Prof Allison Christians (Wisconsin) has launched a tax blog:  Tax Society & Culture. (The tag line is "On fiscal policy, politics, society, philosophy, and culture.")  For a list of all posts, see here.

Retirement Ceremony Today for Dan Simmons

There is a retirement ceremony today to honor legendary UC-Davis Tax Prof Daniel L. SImmons. He is perhaps best known on the scholarly front as a co-author of the Foundation Press business tax, corporate tax, income tax, and partnership and s corporation tax casebooks (with the late Paul McDaniel and Marty McMahon). From Dan's faculty web page:

Many lawyers fall into their fields, more often as a result of circumstance rather than planning. Take, for instance, Dan Simmons. "I came to law school your typical political science major. I had no economics background. I left law school expecting to be a litigator."

Working as a clerk for the California Supreme Court, Simmons discovered "litigation is 90 percent paperwork. When an opportunity arose to work for my tax teacher, I took it." Fifteen years later, as Congress rewrote the Internal Revenue Code, Simmons would occupy the prestigious position of professor in residence in the Office of the Chief Counsel of the IRS.

"You cannot practice law without understanding the income tax system," said the 1971 King Hall alumnus. "There's very little we can do in today's society that doesn't have income tax implications."

For this reason, the tax lawyer is both the ultimate specialist and ultimate generalist, practicing an esoteric brand of law that touches practically every transaction in American society. "Contracts, marital property, trusts, estate planning, immigration, corporations, partnerships, securities, torts, constitutional law, employment discrimination-the tax lawyer must be knowledgeable in all," said Simmons.

Tax Prof Leadership Positions at AALS Annual Meeting

The just-concluded AALS Annual Meeting brought several Tax Profs into leadership roles:

• AALS Section on Administrative Law:  Kristin Hickman (Minnesota), Member, Executive Committee
• AALS Section on Taxation:  Jim Repetti (Boston College), Chair; Reuven Avi-Yonah (Michigan), Chair-Elect; and Miranda Perry Fleischer (Colorado), Member, Executive Committee.
• AALS Section on Trusts & Estates:  Laura Rosenbury (Washington University), Chair; Bill LaPiana (New York Law School), Chair-Elect; Al Brophy (North Carolina), Secretary; and Iris Goodwin (Tennessee), Treasurer.
• AALS Section on Women in Legal Education:  Bridget Crawford (Pace), Chair-Elect.
• CALI (Center for Computer-Assisted Legal Instruction):  Paul Caron (Cincinnati), Vice-President, Board of Directors.

A Conversation With Prof. Charlotte Crane

A Conversation With Prof. Charlotte Crane, 132 Tax Notes 241 (July 18, 2011):

Charlotte Crane is a law professor at Northwestern University School of Law, where she teaches corporate tax and tax policy in both the JD and graduate tax programs and frequently conducts an annual colloquium for academic tax scholarship. She began her law career in 1976 as a law clerk for Judge Wade H. McCree of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit and later served as a law clerk to U.S. Supreme Court Justice Harry A. Blackmun. She also worked as an associate at Hopkins & Sutter in Chicago.

Crane served as the professor in residence at the IRS Office of Chief Counsel for the 2010-2011 academic year. She recently spoke with Tax Analysts' Shamik Trivedi about the IRS guidance process, the effect of the Supreme Court's decision in Mayo, and the chances for corporate tax reform.

All Tax Analysts content is available through the LexisNexis® services.

Tax Prof Dinner in San Diego

Grayson McCouch (San Diego), Karen Burke (San Diego), Khrista McCarden (Pepperdine), Richard Winchester (Thomas Jefferson), Paul Caron (Summer Visitor, San Diego), Francine Lipman (Chapman)

Death of Jim Eustice

Legendary Tax Prof James S. Eustice, Gerald L. Wallace Professor of Taxation Emeritus at NYU, died yesterday at the age of 77. From NYU Dean Richard Revesz:

Jim was a legendary figure in the field of tax law and a beloved member of the Law School community since he joined our faculty in 1960.  After graduating from the Law School with his LL.M. in taxation in 1958, he went on to work for White & Case for two years before returning to NYU to become a full professor at age 32. A distinguished scholar, Jim’s treatise on corporate tax law has long been viewed as the authoritative work on the subject, widely cited by the Supreme Court and regularly used by academics and practitioners.  He was deeply committed to the Law School during his more than five decades here, teaching thousands of students in almost every tax course available.  After retirement, he remained dedicated to his work as of counsel at the firm of Cooley LLP, where he founded the tax department in 1970, and continued to teach at the Law School. He was co-teaching Taxation of Affiliated Corporations this Spring, and remained active and engaged to the very end. 

Jim was a wonderful mentor, a generous colleague, and a dear friend.  A familiar presence around the institution, Jim will be deeply missed. Our thoughts and prayers are with his wife Carol Fonda Eustice, daughter Cynthia Lapier, son James M. Eustice, and their families during this incredibly difficult time.

I will share further details about funeral arrangements as soon as I have more information.

From Jim's NYU faculty web page:

Eustice's main philosophy is to teach the Internal Revenue Code itself, rather than the policy implications of that document. "I've always viewed my main mission as getting people up to snuff on what the law is, rather than what it ought to be. This is the only area of the law where you really do close-in-cape-work with a detailed and complicated statute. There are some statutory courses, but there's nothing really like the Code and its six volumes of regulations."

SoCal Tax Prof Dinner

As we prepare to leave Pepperdine, my wife and I hosted Southern California Tax Profs for a wonderful dinner last night, filled with great food, drink, and conversation.

Chapman Bobby Dexter Mike Lang Francine Lipman LaVerne Victoria Haneman

Loyola-L.A. Ellen Aprill Katie Pratt Ted Seto Pepperdine Tom Bost Khrista McCarden

San Diego Jordan Barry Karen Burke Grayson McCouch Dick Pugh Thomas Jefferson Richard Winchester

UCLA Steve Bank Kirk Stark Eric Zolt USC Ed Kleinbard Ed McCaffery

More on the Death of Meade Emory

Following up on yesterday's post on the death at age 79 of Meade Emory, founding director of the Graduate Tax Program and Professor of Law Emeritus at the University of Washington School of Law:

• Seattle Times, Obituary:

He was a third generation Seattleite, and a third generation lawyer in this city who loved everything about the Pacific Northwest. ... Meade was long active behind the scenes in Democratic politics, having first been attracted when Senator Warren Magnuson appointed him to several "patronage" jobs in Washington, DC during his university years. ... Meade also cultivated many of the trappings and interests of a professor. His staple wardrobe included a bow tie, fedora, highwater trousers, loafers and a fountain pen or two. ...

A memorial service celebrating Meade's life will be held on Friday, October 15, 2010 at St. Mark's Cathedral in Seattle at 2:00 pm. Remembrances may be made to: Providence Hospice of Seattle or the Alzheimer's Association.

• Crosscut, Meade Emory, 'Seattle's Atticus Finch,' Dies at 79:

Meade Emory was a Seattle fixture.  He and his wife Deborah, above all, savored life.  They could be seen at the opera, at Town Hall, at the Seattle Chamber Music Society (which he founded), at book, political, and University of Washington events, and at picnics and poetry readings.  ...

Beyond his official vitae, his many Seattle and other friends knew Meade to be an engaged man.  He read everything, was prepared to discuss and debate any public issue, and also was a walking library of information about all Seattle-related things and persons. ...

Shortly after his retirement from the University of Washington Law School, Meade was beset by physical ailments, including Alzheimer's, which caused the Emorys to retire early in 2009 to Bayview Manor.  Though in recent months mainly confined to bed, and beset with Alzheimer's, Meade continued to receive visitors, to read, and to engage in political gossip.  ...

Yes, he was a man and attorney of character and honor.  It is hard to imagine him on the wrong side of any issue.  It is also hard to imagine Seattle in his absence.  He loved Seattle and, in return, was loved by the most engaged citizens of his city.  His memorial service Friday, at St. Mark's Cathedral, no doubt will be attended by those same citizens. His was a life well and usefully lived.

• Tax Notes Today (2010 TNT 197-6), Tax Professor Meade Emory Dies:

Emory may be most widely known for his connections with the Church of Scientology. Although he was not a Scientologist, in 1982 Emory co-founded the Church of Spiritual Technology (CST), an organization dedicated to preserving and archiving Scientology scripture. CST owns the copyrights to Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard's books and lectures and manages their licenses.

CST petitioned for section 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status in 1983, but the IRS claimed the organization "was created to shelter the income of nonexempt Scientology organizations from taxation." The IRS ultimately recognized CST and 24 other organizations related to the Church of Scientology as tax exempt in an October 1, 1993, closing agreement.

NYU Profile of Josh Blank

NYU Law Alumni Magazine, Introducing Joshua Blank, Associate Professor of the Practice of Tax Law Faculty Director of the Graduate Tax Program:

It is not enough for Joshua Blank (LL.M. ’07) to teach courses, write thoughtful scholarship, and, as faculty director of the graduate tax program, administer a program for 400 full-time, part-time, and online students. He also runs four miles round-trip every day at lunch between Washington Square and Battery Park City, where he drinks in the view of the Statue of Liberty. Clearly, Blank, who joined NYU Law in January, thrives on successful multitasking. “Josh is an excellent administrator, teacher, and scholar—really good at all three,” says Deborah Schenk (LL.M. ’76), Ronald and Marilynn Grossman Professor of Taxation and former faculty director of the program.

Blank, 33, attributes his remarkable capacity to having found his purpose and passion. “This is my dream job,” he said. “I view NYU as the center of the tax universe.”

Director of Duquesne Tax Clinic Sues Dean for Sexual Harassment

Last week, Alice Stewart, Director of the Low-Income Tax Practicum at Duquesne, filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the law school alleging that she was the victim of sexual harassment and retaliation by Dean Kenneth Gormley (video here). Among the allegations are that the Dean interfered with her obtaining a low income tax clinic grant from the IRS and improperly changed her title from "Clinical Professor of Law” to "Director of the Low-Income Tax Practicum”  The law school also faces two other discrimination suits by faculty members: (1) Vanessa Browne-Barbour claims she was denied consideration for the interim deanship on racial and gender grounds; and (2) Kellen McClendon claims he was denied consideration for the deanship on racial grounds.

• ABA Journal, Ex-Law Prof Alleges Harassment by Duquesne Law Dean
• Law Librarian Blog, Duquesne Law School Hit With Discrimination Suits
• Leiter's Law School Reports, Suing the Law Schools
• MSNBC, Duquesne Law Faculty Member Claims Sexual Harassment
• Pittsburgh Channel, Duquesne Law Faculty Member Claims Sexual Harassment
• Pittsburgh City Paper, Black and White Issue
• Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Former Duquesne Faculty Member Files Suit Against University

Prior TaxProf Blog coverage of troubles at Duquesne:

• Duquesne Dean Resigns After Given 24-Hours Notice to Resign or be Fired; Tenure Battle, Lack of Faculty Scholarship Cited as Reasons (Dec. 11, 2008)
• U.S. News Rankings, Lack of Faculty Scholarship Blamed for Duquesne Dean's Firing (Dec. 23, 2008)
• NY Times on Abrupt Firing of Duquesne Law Dean (Dec. 26, 2008)

Death of Paul McDaniel

Paul R. McDaniel, Emeritus James J. Freeland Eminent Scholar in Taxation and Professor of Law at the University of Florida Levin College of Law, died at his home in Gainesville on July 16 after a long illness. The University of Florida has prepared this wonderful tribute to Paul; please read the entire piece.  Here are a few excerpts:

Professor McDaniel joined the faculty of the College of Law in 2004. He had a long and distinguished career as a tax lawyer and professor, and was active as a full-time faculty member, teaching international tax classes and producing tax scholarship, through the Fall term of 2009 before being diagnosed with his final illness around the New Year. He was an exceptional teacher and scholar, and he will be sorely missed by all who have known him as a colleague, teacher and friend. ...

Professor McDaniel’s greatest gift as a teacher and human being was nurturing relationships and he is remembered fondly and with great respect by all his students and colleagues. Professor McDaniel always went out of his way to welcome the international students enrolled in the International Tax Program, hosting a welcoming reception for them and their families at his home each year and, when feasible, before the program grew to it now large size, hosting a Thanksgiving Day dinner at his home for the international students and their families. Over the many years of his teaching career, Professor McDaniel’s character and intellect inspired countless students to pursue careers in tax law, a number of whom he also inspired to follow in his footsteps as law school tax professors. ...

In lieu of flowers, the family requests that memorial donations be made to one of the following: the Paul R. McDaniel International Tax Scholarship fundfor international students and scholars to come participate in the International Tax Program at the University of Florida (University of Florida Law Center Association, Inc., PO Box 14412, Gainesville, FL 32604-4412); the First Presbyterian Church of Alachua (P.O. Box 308, Alachua, FL 32616); or "Food4Kids of Alachua" (c/o First Presbyterian Church of Alachua), the weekend food program Professor McDaniel helped create with his wife.

A memorial service will be held at Westminster Presbyterian Church, Gainesville. A public celebration of Professor McDaniel’s life will take place in the fall at the Baughman Center on the University of Florida campus, on a date to be announced.

Upon learning of Paul's illness, Jim Repetti and I wrote on this blog:

[B]eing asked to join Paul as a co-author was one of the proudest (and most intimidating) moments of our careers. In working with Paul, we have been repeatedly struck by his encyclopedic knowledge of the tax law, clear yet elegant prose, and organizational genius. But what stands out most for us has been Paul’s incredible grace and patience in nurturing two junior co-authors struggling to match the high standards he set in prior editions.

We collected dozens of remebrances from Paul's many friends, colleagues, and former students and presented them in a book for Paul and his family.  On Paul's passing, I thought it would be fitting to post the Tax Prof remembrances below the fold:

• Alice Abreu (Temple)
• Ellen Aprill (Loyola-L.A.)
• Joe Bankman (Stanford)
• Leslie Book (Villanova)
• Fred Brown (Baltimore)
• Leonard Burman (Syracuse)
• Paul Caron (Cincinnati)
• Sheldon Cohen (former IRS Commissioner)
• Bridget Crawford (Pace)
• Laura Cunningham (Cardozo)
• Noel Cunningham (NYU)
• Harvey Dale (NYU)
• Cliff Fleming (BYU)
• Christopher Hanna (SMU)
• Mary Heen (Richmond)
• David Hudson (Florida)
• Michael Knoll (Pennsylvania)
• Michael Livingston (Rutgers-Camden)
• Charlene Luke (Florida)
• Bill Lyons (Nebraska)
• Eric Lustig (New England)
• Ray Madoff (Boston College)
• Marty McMahon (Florida)
• Lori McMillan (Washburn)
• Robert Peroni (Texas)
• Jim Repetti (Boston College)
• Kerry Ryan (St. Louis)
• Deborah Schenk (NYU)
• Len Schmolka (NYU)
• Daniel Shaviro (NYU)
• Miranda Stewart (Melbourne)
• Victor Zonana (NYU)

Alice Abreu, James E. Beasley Professor of Law, Temple University, Beasley School of Law

Paul is a true gentleman - brilliant, kind and devoted to the tax law. The groundbreaking work he and Stanley Surrey did in developing and actualizing the concept of tax expenditures remains one of the most significant developments in tax theory and continues to play a significant role in the evolution of the tax law. Most of us can only dream of a career like his. He has touched not only the law but the lives of countless lawyers and law students who have benefited from his grace and wisdom. My thoughts are with him and his family during this difficult time.

Ellen P. Aprill, Professor of Law and John E. Anderson Chair in Tax Law, Loyola Law School Los Angeles

Paul is a true gentleman and a scholar -- always gracious and courteous to everyone he encounters, intellectually honorable and thoughtful in every endeavor.

Joseph Bankman, Ralph M. Parsons Professor of Law and Business, Stanford Law School

I echo Mike Livingston's comments (and the comments of many others): Paul has played a leading role in the profession while being one of the sweetest guys in the profession.

Leslie Book, Professor of Law and Director of Graduate Tax Program, Villanova University School of Law

I had the good fortune to have Prof McDaniel for corporate tax and a tax policy seminar in NYU. His classroom demeanor was quiet, but he was demanding and he set the bar high. His calm and good natured prodding --especially as I was stumbling through a paper on the VAT--inspired me then, and still today, as I strive to approach students in my current role as teacher. He was one of the best tax professors I had, and I consider myself very lucky to have had him as a professor for two wonderful graduate tax classes. My thoughts are with him and his family.

Fred Brown, Associate Professor of Law & Director of Graduate Tax Program, University of Baltimore School of Law

Paul, I very much enjoyed our time together at NYU. Your writings have been invaluable to me and many others. You are truly a giant in tax and as a person. My thoughts are with you.

Leonard E. Burman, Daniel Patrick Moynihan Professor of Public Affairs, Maxwell School of Syracuse University

Thanks for posting the news about Paul McDaniel. He is one of my heroes. I can understand why you were awed at the prospect of working with him.

Paul might be interested in this op ed I wrote for the Washington Post yesterday, suggesting that tax expenditures be subject to budget caps (as proposed for non-security discretionary spending).

Clearly Paul and Stanley Surrey have had a huge effect on my work and career—and many other public finance economists’. I will pray for him and his family.

Paul L. Caron, Associate Dean of Faculty & Charles Hartsock Professor of Law, University of Cincinnati College of Law(with Jim Repetti)

By any reckoning, Paul is one of the most influential tax scholars and teachers of the past 50 years. Paul’s signal scholarly achievement among his fifty law review articles and ten books is his pioneering work on tax expenditure analysis with Stanley Surrey, culminating in their 1985 Harvard University Press book, Tax Expenditures

. Paul has influenced generations of tax students with his six casebooks (Federal Income Taxation, Federal Income Taxation of Business Organizations, Federal Income Taxation of Corporations, Federal Income Taxation of Partnerships and S Corporations, Federal Wealth Transfer Taxation, and Introduction to United States International Taxation).

For us, being asked to join Paul as a co-author was one of the proudest (and most intimidating) moments of our careers. In working with Paul, we have been repeatedly struck by his encyclopedic knowledge of the tax law, clear yet elegant prose, and organizational genius. But what stands out most for us has been Paul’s incredible grace and patience in nurturing two junior co-authors struggling to match the high standards he set in prior editions. Jim is especially grateful to have also benefitted from Paul’s tutelage as his student at Boston College Law School and later as his colleague at Hill & Barlow and Boston College.

Sheldon S. Cohen, Director, Farr, Miller & Washington, Washington, D.C.; former Commissioner, Internal Revenue Service

Paul and I met when he first came to work for Stan Surrey at the Treasury in 1967. Stanley had a great staff and Paul was one of the very best. Paul was fired by the Republican Admin when it first arrived in the spring of 1969. Paul's brother in Okla had worked against the senator from there and he insisted that Paul, a career lawyer on the tax staff be fired. Paul called me and told me this as it happen. I had resigned as Commr of IRS at noon on Jan 20, 1969. It was an odd coincidence that that day Sen. Albert Gore, a senior member of the Finance committee had called me asking for help in finding someone for his staff who could help on tax issues as the 1969 Act was beginning its move about that time. I suggested the Gore job and called Sen Gore to tell him of Paul's abilities. I take a little credit for getting Paul the opportunity which he did great work in. He is a dear friend of close to 50 years and is a worthy successor to my friend, Stanley Surrey. I send him all my best wishes.

Bridget Crawford, Professor of Law & Associate Dean for Research and Faculty Development, Pace Law School

Professor McDaniel is an intellectual giant in the field, and his work is one of my "go-to" resources for questions involving federal estate and gift taxation. I admire his work tremendously.

Laura Cunningham, Professor of Law, Cardozo School of Law, Yeshiva University

I will always be grateful for the kindness and generosity that Paul extended to me in the early years of my teaching career. In addition to being a supportive colleague, he became a warm and wonderful friend, and I am among those people he has touched who will sorely miss him. My heart and prayers are with him and Ginny.

Noel Cunningham, Professor of Law, New Your University School of Law

I have known Paul for 25 years both as a friend and a colleague. He is truly a remarkable man. Not only is he an excellent scholar and teacher from whom I learned so much, but, more importantly, he is also one of the best people I have ever met. My prayers too are with Paul and Ginny.

Harvey Dale, University Professor of Philanthropy and the Law & Director, National Center on Philanthropy and the Law, New Your University School of Law

Paul has been my friend since 1958 when we both entered law school together. Our friendship deepened when Paul joined the NYU Tax Faculty and we were then able to work together, play together, discuss together, and even argue together on a regular basis. Paul is one of the smartest, nicest, kindest people I have ever met. My life is much richer for having known him; I have learned an enormous amount from him. Debra and I went to his wedding on Martha's Vineyard at the Chilmark Community Church in May of 1997 and were so delighted to see him and Ginny so happy together. Paul is a consummate law professor and a marvelous friend. I am most grateful for the more than 50 years that I have been able to share good times and good conversation with him.

Cliff Fleming, Ernest L. Wilkinson Chair and Professor of Law, Reuben Clark Law School, Brigham Young University

I've never had the pleasure of becoming acquainted with Paul. His work, however, has had a fundamental impact on the way I have thought about tax policy and presented it to students for the last 35 years. Indeed, much of my own scholarly work in the most recent years has been devoted to explaining to Paul's critics why he got it right. So I deeply appreciate his contributions and wish him comfort and contentment.

Christopher Hanna, Professor of Law and University Distinguished Teaching Professor, Southern Methodist University Dedman School of Law

I got to know Paul when I visited UF back in 2005. He is a true gentleman and a great scholar. Many times I asked him about his time at Treasury in the late 1960s. I always enjoyed hearing his stories about working at Treasury during the Stanley Surrey years. My thoughts and prayers are with him and Ginny.

Mary L. Heen, Professor of Law, University of Richmond School of Law

We all have great appreciation for Paul McDaniel's work as an important scholar of tax expenditure theory and influential voice in the world of international tax. In addition, I'd like to thank him for his thoughtful and inspiring teaching. Paul McDaniel was my Corporate Tax professor in the spring semester of his visit at NYU, shortly after the enactment of the Tax Reform Act of 1986. It was a big class but he divided us into teams and assigned us written memos on reorganization problems. He took the time to meet with each team in his office, offering us feedback and warm words of encouragement. We all send you our own warm words of support and encouragement during your difficult fight with this illness!

David Hudson, Professor of Law, University of Florida Levin College of Law

Paul has been a terrific colleague here at Florida for the past several years. Always with a big smile and a willingness to help in whatever way that he could. I am lucky to have the good fortune to have met and worked with Paul.

Michael S. Knoll, Theodore K. Warner Professor of Law & Professor of Real Estate; Co-Director, Center for Tax Law and Policy, University of Pennsylvania Law School

Paul, I was very sorry to hear of your illness. You probably do not remember me as we only met a few times, but I always appreciated your willingness to talk with a young colleague. In recent years, as I have started to write about international tax, I found you to be one of the scholars from whom I have learned the most. I wish you and your family the very best in these difficult times.

Michael A. Livingston, Professor of Law, Rutgers School of Law - Camden

And one of the nicest people you'll ever meet. He could discuss everything from law to politics without ever dropping a single name or displaying the slightest bit of snobbery . . . and he had more basis to be a snob than most. I don't think they make them quite like this any more.

Charlene Luke, Assistant Professor of Law, University of Florida Levin College of Law

I joined UF in 2008 as an assistant professor. It can feel a bit surreal to have The Paul McDaniel sit in on a class or read an article rough draft, but Paul always knows how to provide invaluable advice with just the right mix of encouragement and caring. I feel very fortunate to have Paul as a colleague and mentor.

Eric A. Lustig, Professor of Law, New England Law School

Paul--Ann and I are so sorry to hear of your illness. My thoughts go back to Gainesville in Spring 1993 and Tax Policy, tennis (played and watched), Pasta Palace, talking politics and good paperback mysteries. We are thinking of you and Ginny.

Bill Lyons, Richard H. Larson Professor of Tax Law, University of Nebraska College of Law

Paul introduced me to the study of federal income taxation when I was one of his students at Boston College Law School. His skillful blending of tax policy and careful technical reading has shaped and informed my teaching style. I have been teaching federal income taxation courses since 1981 and I have yet to repay my debt to Paul. My thoughts and prayers are with Paul and his family.

Ray D. Madoff, Professor of Law, Boston College Law School

I am forever appreciative of the significant role that Paul McDaniel played in my career. I went to work at Hill and Barlow for the express purpose of being able to study with the master. He did not disappoint. Paul McDaniel was everything one could want in a role model: extraordinarily knowledgeable, creative in his thinking and always mindful of the human aspect of tax. Despite his extraordinary accomplishments, at heart he was always the boy from Oklahoma. It was a great honor to work with him and he will leave a gaping hole. My prayers go out to Paul and his family that Paul defies the odds and continues to lead the way for us for a long time to come.

Marty McMahon, Stephen C. O’Connell Professor of Law, University of Florida Levin College of Law

I can honestly say, without reservation, that except for my wife, Pam, Paul McDaniel has been the most important positive influence in my life. Without Paul as a role model and mentor, I never would have been where I am today. I enrolled in Boston College Law School in the fall of 1971 largely because I had no idea what I wanted to do after graduating from college. I drifted though my first year of law school, wondering whether any of it really interested me, but when I encountered the Tax I course, with Paul as my teacher in my second year of law school, I was captivated by both the Professor and the subject. In that class, and several in subsequent classes, Paul inspired me to become a tax lawyer and instilled in me the ambition someday to become a law school tax professor. After a few years of practice, I visited Paul at B.C. to ask how to try to obtain a law school teaching position, and he helped me understand the process, as a result of which, with him as a reference, I landed a law school teaching job. In everything I have done as a law school professor, I have striven to model myself after Paul, thinking that if I could just measure up by some small fraction, I should consider myself to have done well. Over the years, I kept in regular contact with Paul to seek advice, and seven years after I started my law school teaching career, he invited me to join him as a junior coauthor on the casebooks of which he had by then become the senior coauthor (as a protégée of Stanley Surrey). That collaboration, which has been the principal focus of my scholarly academic pursuits ever since, has now lasted nearly 25 years and is still going strong. Most important of all, however, was the sequence of events that began with a telephone conversation between Paul and me a few days before Christmas in 2003, which started as purely social call, but which ultimately resulted in Paul joining me as colleague on the faculty at the University of Florida College of Law in the summer of 2004. At long last, I was able to work on a daily personal contact basis with the one person who had most shaped my entire professional life. I am forever indebted and grateful to Paul for all that has done for me and for being the most wonderful friend and colleague imaginable. Thank you, Paul, from the bottom of my heart.

Lori McMillan, Associate Professor of Law, Washburn University School of Law

Paul was the head of the International Graduate Tax Program when I did my International Tax LLM at NYU. He is one of the most brilliant yet kindest men I have ever met, and I thoroughly enjoyed learning from him. He was very good to those of us in the program, and it was easy to forget his high profile when interacting with him. He's a large part of why I became a law professor. My thoughts are with him and Ginny as he battles this disease. The world is a better place for having known him.

Robert J. Peroni, James A. Elkins Centennial Chair in Law, University of Texas School of Law

I am so sorry to hear about Paul's illness. He is one of the most decent and talented people that I have had the pleasure to get to know in the academic world. He is a wonderful friend and colleague and dedicated and caring teacher. And, of course, he is one of the top tax expenditure theory and international tax scholars, whose work has served as a great inspiration to those of us who also write in those fields. Paul, thanks for everything. My thoughts and prayers are with you and your family.

James R. Repetti, William J. Kenealy, S.J. Professor of Law, Boston College Law School (with Paul Caron)

By any reckoning, Paul is one of the most influential tax scholars and teachers of the past 50 years. Paul’s signal scholarly achievement among his fifty law review articles and ten books is his pioneering work on tax expenditure analysis with Stanley Surrey, culminating in their 1985 Harvard University Press book, Tax Expenditures. Paul has influenced generations of tax students with his six casebooks (Federal Income Taxation, Federal Income Taxation of Business Organizations, Federal Income Taxation of Corporations, Federal Income Taxation of Partnerships and S Corporations, Federal Wealth Transfer Taxation, and Introduction to United States International Taxation).

For us, being asked to join Paul as a co-author was one of the proudest (and most intimidating) moments of our careers. In working with Paul, we have been repeatedly struck by his encyclopedic knowledge of the tax law, clear yet elegant prose, and organizational genius. But what stands out most for us has been Paul’s incredible grace and patience in nurturing two junior co-authors struggling to match the high standards he set in prior editions. Jim is especially grateful to have also benefitted from Paul’s tutelage as his student at Boston College Law School and later as his colleague at Hill & Barlow and Boston College.

Kerry Ryan, Assistant Professor of Law, Saint Louis University School of Law

I had the good fortune to cross paths with Paul during my VAP year at UF. He is a model academic and a model person. My thoughts and prayers are with him and Ginny.

Deborah Schenk, Donald and Marilynn Grossman Professor of Taxation; Editor-in-Chief, Tax Law Review, New York University School of Law

It was my pleasure to be part of the tax group at NYU when Paul was the director. Paul was such a talented teacher, scholar and administrator. It was a delight to walk down the hall and talk with him about all things tax (and occasionally other things as well). He was so generous with his time and I always came away with a greater understanding of whatever topic we had hashed out. We are still benefitting from his work at NYU since he was the founder of our International Tax Program. The wonderful students that come our way come in large part because of the curriculum he created. I've also benefitted from his several coursebooks that are worthy competitors and of course his work on tax expenditures--a lasting tribute. Most of all I benefitted from just knowing Paul the person--he is such a kind, gentle, good human being, free of arrogance and pomp. There are not too many people who are giants not only in their profession but also in their family, community, and church.

Our thoughts and prayers are with him and Ginny.

Len (Leo) Schmolka, Professor of Law, New York University School of Law

First and foremost, Paul was a dear friend, always generous with his wise counsel, laughter, good humor and rational views on politics, people and life. Some of his jokes were clunkers, but that happens to the best of raconteurs.

As a tax lawyer and scholar, Paul seems to be most often recognized for his contributions to tax policy via tax expenditure analysis. I, however, recognize him for the extraordinary breadth and depth of his knowledge and insights across the entire spectrum of income taxation and wealth transfer taxation. Few of his generation were his equal in that.

Paul's door was always open. Countless times I'd wander into his office across the hall from mine with a perplexing question about some tax issue or another. No matter the subchapter or chapter of the Code involved, Paul usually had a ready answer, most often correct, but invariably an unerring instinct about what the right answer ought to be. I never left his office without knowing more, generally much more, than when I entered.

Ever since Paul left NYU and Washington Square, I have sorely missed our collegial exchanges and our many, many enjoyable dinners together.

Daniel Shaviro, Wayne Perry Professor of Taxation, New Your University School of Law

Paul McDaniel is a great scholar and a wonderful man. I was lucky to have him as a colleague for several years at NYU, where he played a huge role in directing our tax program and helping to upgrade it. When Paul was named the head of the NYU tax program, I joked that John Sexton (our dean at the time) had picked Paul because he needed a "wartime consigliere." The quote is of course from The Godfather, when Michael tells Tom that he's out as consigliere for failing to fit this bill. The joke was that, on the one hand, we really did need someone to take on the job aggressively, as Paul could and did, but at the same time that the notion of Paul being a war maker is absurd.

Paul is a lovely and gentle man, and as a scholar is exceptionally scrupulous and rigorous. We had some very interesting conversations about tax expenditures (on which he presented some of his work at the NYU Tax Policy Colloquium), and he offered keen insight into Stanley Surrey's dual objectives in TE analysis of both offering a neutral descriptive tool and trying to give his own side a leg up in the tax reform debate. Paul believes that TE analysis should just be a neutral descriptive tool, leaving the tax reform battles to be conducted separately on their merits. He also has pioneered expanding the concept to other countries and other taxes. I was very sorry when he left NYU to go to Florida, although with the terrible winters we've been having I can certainly see the logic of it. My thoughts and best wishes are with him in these tough times.

Miranda Stewart, Associate Professor of Law & Co-Director of Taxation Studies, Melbourne Law School, Australia

Paul and Ginny: You know all this! - I was privileged to have been taught by Paul in the International Tax program at NYU more than a decade ago, for which he was an innovator as in so many other areas of tax teaching and research. His influence on tax scholars and professionals over the last two decades has been global in reach. He hired me then to teach at NYU and with his mild suggestion that I develop a comparative tax policy course, initiated my research interest in tax reform processes across countries that continues to this day while I have returned "down under". It was a pleasure to visit Paul at U Florida a couple of years ago and to see Paul and Ginny in their beautiful home. Thinking of you both at this tough time.

Victor Zonana, Adjunct Professor of Law, New York University School of Law

Paul is a well grounded scholar, a visionary and a real gentleman to boot. Nearly 40 years ago I had the privilege of serving as editor-in-chief of the Tax Law Review. One of the first articles I selected and personally edited (though Paul's work needed very little editing) was his article on the charitable contribution deduction. The ideas are still robust and resonate today. Paul's initiative in starting the International Tax Program at NYU and developing it to maturity and worldwide recognition over a brief seven-year period is a superb achievement. I am very fortunate to be able to teach this year and next in that program (another connection to Paul). Paul was real friend and supporter when I had occasion to visit at NYU on a sabbatical from practice in the Spring of 1994. His door was always open, he always had a welcoming smile on his face and his words and advice always wise. Thank you, Paul, for being ...Paul.

Sam Donaldson, Wikipedia, and 'The 2% Haircut'

Check out this Wikipedia entry on § 67(a), the 2% floor on miscellaneous itemized deductions: The Two-Percent Haircut:

The Two-Percent Haircut^[1], otherwise known as the two-percent floor, is a limitation on miscellaneous itemized income tax deductions and is codified under Internal Revenue Code.  I.R.C. § 67(a). ...

[Fn.1: Samuel A. Donaldson (Washington), Federal Income Taxation of Individuals: Cases, Problems, and Materials 30 (Thomson-West, 2d ed. 2007).]

The policy reason for the two-percent haircut is quite evasive. We may be able to gauge Congress' intent with the two-percent haircut by looking at the possible reasons for including certain items. The most significant expense that is categorized as a miscellaneous itemized deduction is the unreimbursed business expenses of an employee. It is a possibility that Congress imposed the two-percent haircut on these expenses in order to weed out portions that may have been personal in nature, as major employee expenses are generally reimbursed by the employer anyway. However, this policy rationale doesn't make much sense when one considers Congress' unlimited allowance of many personal expense deductions (some above-the line). The two-percent haircut is a thing of mystery.

(Hat Tip: Lauren Jones.)

Public Law School Faculty Salaries

Brian Leiter flags this site as a source for public law school faculty salaries (as well as salaries of law school librarians and administrators):

• Arizona State
• Florida
• George Mason
• Illinois
• Michigan
• Missouri (Columbia)
• North Carolina
• Ohio State
• Rutgers (Camden & Newark)
• SUNY (Buffalo)
• Texas
• Virginia
• William & Mary
• Wisconsin

For some reason, law faculty salaries at UC-Berkeley, UC-Davis, UC-Irvine, and UCLA are searchable only by individual faculty name.

SoCal Tax Profs

Thanks to Tax Profs Francine Lipman (Chapman) and Richard Winchester (Thomas Jefferson) for the wonderful lunch today in Pacific Beach.  In addition to seeing Francine's spectacular condos (that's not a typo) and celebrating Richard's well-deserved award of tenure, it was nice to catch up on each other's work, schools, and families.  I initially met Francine and Richard through the virtual Tax Prof community of this blog and listserv, and it was fun to break bread together in person.

   

NPR: Martin Ginsburg's Legacy: Love Of Justice (Ginsburg)

Following up on Wednesday's post, Remembering Marty Ginsburg (1932-2010):  NPR Weekend Edition, Martin Ginsburg's Legacy: Love Of Justice (Ginsburg), by Nina Totenberg (listen to the story here, with several clips of Marty):

The Ginsburg marriage was one of those marvels of life, a 56-year marathon of love and support.

Martin D. Ginsburg met Ruth Bader on a blind date at Cornell. She was 17; he a year older. As he would later put it, she was a "top student." He was a "top golfer." ...

In recent weeks, facing a losing battle with cancer, Marty Ginsburg wrote to his wife that setting aside parents and kids, "you are the only person I have loved in my life. ... I have admired and loved you almost since the day we first met at Cornell some 56 years ago."

Turning introspective about his own life, he told a friend, "I think that the most important thing I have done is to enable Ruth to do what she has done."

(Hat Tip: Mike Talbert.)

Remembering Marty Ginsburg (1932-2010)

Following up on Sunday's post on the death of renowned tax professor (Georgetown) and tax lawyer (Fried Frank) Martin D. Ginsburg, husband of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg:  over two dozen of Marty's tax friends and colleagues offer their remembrances and tributes below the fold.

• Alice Abreu (Temple)
• Ellen Aprill (Loyola-L.A.)
• Reuven Avi-Yonah (Michigan)
• Jordan Barry (San Diego)
• Linda Beale (Wayne State)
• Daniel Berman (Boston University)
• Jack Bogdanski (Lewis & Clark)
• Evelyn Brody (Chicago-Kent)
• Paul Caron (Cincinnati)
• Mark Cochran (St. Mary's)
• Sheldon Cohen (Washington, D.C. tax lawyer and former IRS Commissioner)
• Cliff Fleming (BYU)
• Jonathan Forman (Oklahoma)
• Albert Golbert (Los Angeles tax lawyer and former adjunct professor)
• James Halpern (Judge, U.S. Tax Court)
• Christopher Hanna (SMU)
• Calvin Johnson (Texas)
• Michael Knoll (Pennsylvania)
• Jeffrey Kwall (Loyola-Chicago)
• Louis Lobenhofer (Ohio Northern)
• Roberta Mann (Oregon)
• Elliott Manning (Miami
• James Maule (Villanova)
• Joel Newman (Wake Forest)
• Robert Peroni (Texas)
• Randle Pollard (Widener)
• Toni Robinson (Quinnipiac)
• Adam Rosenzweig (Washington University)
• Deborah Schenk (NYU)
• David Shakow (Pennsylvania)
• Daniel Shaviro (NYU)

Alice Abreu (Temple):

One of my favorite and most revealing Ginsburg stories is one that Marty told himself when he accepted the Tax Section's Distinguished Service Award. I was in the audience when he gave the speech and was then the Editor of the Section's NewsQuarterly. I was so taken with it that I went up to him afterwards and asked if I could have it for publication in the NQ, an invitation which he graciously accepted. Here is the link for the piece, which I think was later published elsewhere. It's quite wonderful, not the least for the admiration and love between him and Ruth that comes through loud and clear. The combination of that and the piece you put on TaxProf blog from her describing him are really quite special and inspirational. Vintage Ginsburg.

Ellen Aprill (Loyola-L.A.):

When I was at the Office of Tax Legislative Counsel in the late 1980's, we staffers would find ourselves wondering whether we had the resources -- meaning brain power and time, to make a rule we were working on "Marty Ginsburg-proof." Trying to imagine what approach he would take meant asking ourselves to do our very best work - and more. In recent years, whenever I would see Marty at a tax meeting or conference, he would always have a kind word and the twinkle in his eye that reflected his zest for life. It is hard to imagine the tax world without him. It will be a professional world that is less challenging, less interesting, and less fun.

Reuven Avi-Yonah (Michigan):

I met Marty several times and once had the pleasure of enjoying his wonderful cooking skills. He was a great mentor- when I was just beginning to teach, he told me that the only way to teach tax law is to understand what the loopholes were that various provisions aimed at closing, and therefore it is essential to teach cases that have been overruled by legislation. I have followed his advice ever since. He will be sorely missed.

Jordan Barry (San Diego):

I met Marty while working as an associate at Fried Frank, before I went into academia. He was in the Washington office and I was in the New York office, so we didn't meet right away, but his reputation preceded him -- partners in our office talked about how much he knew and how good an attorney he was. Still, I remember how impressed I was when I first saw him in action in front of a client. He was phenomenal -- relaxed, supremely knowledgeable, completely in control of the situation. I have worked with many accomplished tax attorneys, and I have never seen any of them perform as well as Marty did that day.

But of course, Marty's personal qualities were so much more important than his skill as a tax attorney. He was vivacious and he had a great sense of humor. He was very kind. He was generous with his time, always happy to help anyone who needed it. He was always happy to talk about his family, which was clearly his greatest source of pride and joy in life. He was a real presence who cast a long shadow, and he will be sorely missed.

Linda Beale (Wayne State):

As an associate at Cleary Gottlieb who had come to tax law later in life than most, I found the Ginsburg & Levin work on mergers & acquisitions indispensable from day one, when I was charged with writing my first acquisition memo. As my years in practice progressed, I realized that Ginsburg’s work provided a solid foundation for transactional tax practice. I never knew him personally but, like every tax lawyer, I owe him a considerable debt of gratitude for helping make a complex system of taxation much more comprehensible, and practice more doable, than they otherwise would have been.

Daniel Berman (Boston University):

One of the lesser-known fringe benefits of working in tax policy positions with the federal government is the opportunity to get to know many leading members of the private tax bar as they contribute to the work of the government. Getting to know Marty Ginsburg was a real treat. He was unfailingly thoughtful, helpful, humble, and gracious. I especially appreciated the effort he made, when I became an adjunct professor of law at Georgetown, to take me around and introduce me to Dean Areen and members of the faculty. When the best tax lawyer in the United States doesn’t take himself too seriously, you know he’s someone special! We will feel Marty’s absence for a long time.

Jack Bogdanski (Lewis & Clark):

Marty Ginsburg, hands down the most gifted tax lawyer on the planet, died yesterday. Not only was he a spectacular advisor, advocate, teacher, thinker, and writer, but also an accomplished chef, and a hilarious comic when he wanted to be, which was often.

Leave it to Marty to depart this world when matters of death and taxes are unsettled. He and his previously departed colleagues are probably laughing it up right now over the fact that nobody knows for sure what the tax "basis" is in the stuff he left behind.

Our condolences to his family and to his many friends. There won't be another like him.

Evelyn Brody (Chicago-Kent):

I took Business Planning from Marty in his first year at Georgetown (and my third) -- he moved to DC from New York, of course, to follow his wife, who was appointed to the D.C. Circuit. At the time Marty sported short-sleeve dress shirts and ties that came down just below his sternum. (In recent years he became quite the snazzy dresser.) The course was team taught by a corporations professor; Marty loved to pop up with, "But what are the TAX implications of that?" I still use my favorite Marty line on my students to get them to relax:  "Basic tax, as everyone knows, is the only genuinely funny subject in law school."

Paul Caron (Cincinnati):

It is safe to say that we will never see the likes of Marty Ginsburg again -- spectacular teacher, co-author of the seminal corporate tax treatise, brilliant practitioner, and joyful man. Georgetown has the opportunity to honor this tax legend when it fills the Martin D. Ginsburg Professor of Tax Law chair endowed by Ross Perot in recognition of Marty's work in structuring GM's acquisition of Electronic Data Systems. I can think of no higher honor in the tax world. 

Mark Cochran (St. Mary's):

About twenty years ago I had the privilege of taking a course on Installment Sales that Marty Ginsburg offered as part of the in-house education program at the IRS Chief Counsel’s Office, where I was serving as Professor In Residence. Marty’s reputation preceded him, and he more than lived up to it. The course materials, which still sit on my bookshelf in a three-ring binder, were elegantly presented and deceptively simple, demonstrating Marty’ knack for putting his finger on the statutory soft spots. In the classroom, Marty was delightful. His technical skill was remarkable, but his gentleness and self-deprecating humor were an unexpected treat.

Sheldon Cohen (Washington, D.C. tax lawyer and former IRS Commissioner):

I first met Marty in 1964 shortly after I became Chief Counsel of the IRS. I had grown up as a tax lawyer in that office and had the idea of sponsoring an educational opportunity for the young lawyers in that office to meet and be taught by some of the best legal minds in the tax field. It would provide an educational opportunity but at the same time would help me develop a cohesive atmosphere and spirit in the office. I searched for the lead prof and was steered on to a young relatively new prof at Columbia, Martin Ginsburg. He gave the first seminar on "collapsible corporations" a new and hot subject in 1964, not talked of at all today. Since that time in 1964 Marty and I have been close friends.

When Marty was in NY, he was only a phone call away and we would call and chat when the occasion was appropriate. When Marty came to town in the 80's after his wife's appointment to the D.C. Circuit Court, he and I discussed the teaching opportunities at the local law schools. One of the great opportunities that this gave me was the chance to see Marty and Ruth on a more regular basis. I was fortunate to be a the White House on the day President Clinton announced Ruth's nomination to the Supreme Court and I stood in the rear to hear the announcement. It was a thrill for me, I can only imagine how Marty felt as he had such pride in Ruth's job to that point. Faye and I would see the Ginsburg's on regular occasions as I have been the Treasurer of the Supreme Court Historical Society and they attend and participate in the programs of the Society regularly. He was a great lawyer, teacher and most of all friend. We and the tax system will miss him dearly but we and the world in which he lived are so much better because he taught us so much.

Cliff Fleming (BYU):

When I was Professor-in-Residence in the IRS Chief Counsel's Office during the 85-86 year, I once found myself in a meeting with senior staff where I was arguing for a taxpayer-favorable result with respect to a particular type of corporate transaction. When I finished, a senior executive said something to this effect: "your argument sounds right but we're not going to adopt it because I know that if we do, a week later Marty Ginsburg will be in here using it as precedent for approval of a transaction that we never imagined. Meeting over."

Jonathan Forman (Oklahoma):

Marty was a real gentleman, and he was always generous with his time and vast knowledge. I will miss him.

Albert Golbert (Los Angeles tax lawyer and former adjunct professor)

Professor Martin Ginsburg, known to all of us as "Marty," was always a favorite speaker at the annual or periodic meetings of the California Tax bars. We even sent him a offer to speak whenever he had the time or felt the need for a bit of California sunshine. I am not aware of any other speaker who had a standing invitation to address our tax bars any time he or she were willing to make the trek. But Marty was different.

There are any number of speakers who can be informative; others who can do so and also be enlightening. Still others exist who are entertaining. None of them could do what Marty did in terms of educational quality coupled with unparalleled humor. Whether he was reinventing the whole notion of corporate reorganization or dissecting a leveraged buy-out, he had the rapt attention of everyone within earshot. His disquisitions were liberally salted with side-splitting irony or satirical musings, that kept us all amused even as we were being amazed by his erudition. The laughter emanating from his programs could be heard at the far ends of the building, and the glow from his presentations lasted throughout the day.

We shall always remember how Marty amazed us by his ability to turn statutes inside out and upside down while opening new ways of thinking about the extent and limitations of the laws we love to hate and hate to love. Marty was always a major attraction and draw at our programs, and all of us who were witness to his presentations were educated by them and touched by him. We will miss him.

James Halpern (Judge, U.S. Tax Court):

For almost 10 years after I joined the Tax Court I lunched regularly with Judge Ted Tannenwald and Marty Ginsburg. I loved those lunches with two giants of the tax bar. At the memorial ceremony to honor Ted, both Marty and I spoke in praise of Ted. I described how, after those lunches, I would recount for my wife over dinner the delightful conversations we had had at lunch that day. After one of the early lunches, knowing both Ted and Marty (and, of course, me), my wife asked: "Who gets to talk first?" I relayed the question to Ted, who answered for both himself and Marty: "We all do!" Marty and I continued those lunches after Ted died, lately with Professor Ron Pearlman. I loved those lunches. Marty was a good man, a fine teacher, and a true friend. I will miss him.

Christopher Hanna (SMU):

I still remember my first contact with Professor Ginsburg (even though he always told me to call him "Marty," I felt more comfortable addressing him as "Professor Ginsburg"). I was a junior, untenured faculty member and had co-authored a draft of an article on installment sales. One part of the article, for which I was responsible, generated some negative comments from reviewers who thought I had made a "big mistake." Not knowing who to turn to, I decided (with some trepidation) to send a fax to Professor Ginsburg and ask for his opinion on the issue. The next day, I received a fax from him, which read: "I agree with you and cannot guess what the big mistake might be." I still have that fax. I always appreciated Professor Ginsburg taking the time to respond to a question from a junior tax law professor. He really was one of the true giants in our field.

Calvin Johnson (Texas):

Martin Ginsburg gave the most enthralling example of the art of teaching tax that I have heard. In a symposium on I believe on tax simplification he described the history of the reasonable basis standard for positions on a tax return. His example was a business cost, I think a prepayment, which generally accepted accounting would clearly have capitalized. The cost had not expired by year end, it was related to future income like an investment, and it was properly matched against the future income. The question was whether the taxpayer could deduct it immediately under ABA ethics and whether a tax adviser could tell the client to expense it. Marty recounted the history of the reasonable basis standard within the ABA. Proponents analogized the tax return to a complaint initiating a law suit, and stuck to the analogy. Opponents, Marty explained, showed that a tax return is different from a complaint. You can go to jail for what you put on tax return, while there is a liberty right of petition to the courts for redress, even on a quite novel theory. Tax returns are sworn to be correct. The defendant joins suit against complaints, but the IRS audits a return in half a percent of the cases. Marty had us all very skeptical about the low ethical stance of the ABA on return position in his case and then he pulled the rabbit out of the hat: The IRS had ruled in 1943, I believe, that the very expense could not be capitalized. The taxpayer had incurred the cost in 1940 when rates were low and wanted to use the expense against the extraordinary tax rates enacted in 1942, and the IRS representing Uncle Sam ruled tactically. Marty did not say it on that occasion, but it was an illustration of his recurring warning to the IRS: Beware of the rod of Aaron, which will turn into a snake and bite you on the backside. On that day, he had his audience in the palm of his hand.

When I started practice at Paul, Weiss in the early 1970s, Ginsburg’s unpublished outlines were passed around the law firms like samizdat. They were a godsend to a young associate trying to figure out the logic of triangular reorganizations or the limits of installment sales. His outlines had the same clarity and thoroughness that made his “Mergers, Acquisitions and Leveraged Buyouts” so great, and of course on top of all the lovely articles he has written, Mergers and Acquisitions” is the masterwork that celebrates him as such an important figure in tax. Or that and building up Weil Gotshall entirely from scratch and serving on the Columbia and Georgetown Law faculty.

One the great pleasures of being Professor in Residence at IRS Chief Counsel was that Marty’s office was across the street and I could have lunch with him over my stay. I never lose an opportunity to talk to Marty about tax issues, or rather now, alas, I must say I never did. I was often on the other side of the issue under discussion. He represented venture capital funds, and I think the funds are nuts to force C corporations on their portfolio ventures and bury their tax deductions. He is mostly responsible for the liberalization of installment sales in the 1980 Act, and I think the liberalization made great tax shelters and that installment sales should be seriously cut back. I think Elkhorn Coal represents the right norm for spinning off unwanted assets, and he believes in Morrison Trust easy spin off rules. He did represent his clients. Still I would walk the distance between us, if I could, for the opportunity to talk some tax, even if just for one more time. He was always charming, always clear and always a delight.

Michael Knoll (Pennsylvania):

Over the years, I learned much from Marty -- reading his writings, hearing him speak, and occasionally talking with him. I particularly remember Marty describing how the tax system in one of the Scandinavian countries for many years discouraged marriage. He described in great detail the back and forth between taxpayers and tax collectors as to how the tax system would try to assess whether previously legally married couples who had divorced in response to the law were in fact married (same address, cohabitation, etc.), but that the authorities were stymied in collecting the marriage penalty from couples that never married. As a result of the tax system, the standard for a committed relationship was to become engaged (to be married) and just never marry. However, when the law changed and the marriage penalty was eliminated, many couples including those with grown kids who had been together for many years, decided to tie the knot. I remember Marty finishing the story by describing attending such friends' wedding. I often use this story in my basic tax class as an example of how tax can affect behavior.

Jeffrey Kwall (Loyola-Chicago):

I don't recall speaking to Marty in person, but I was privileged on several occasions to talk with him over the phone to get his reactions to drafts I had asked him to read. No matter how busy he was, he was always receptive to reading and commenting on the work of a young colleague. And he never did a superficial read; rather, he provided detailed, thoughtful comments and insisted on reviewing his comments over the phone no matter how long that might take. His comments were always helpful and his generosity in time and spirit will always be remembered.

Louis Lobenhofer (Ohio Northern):

I only met Prof. Ginsburg once, at the NYU Graduate Tax Workshop, but I was very impressed by his encyclopedic knowledge and his brilliant analysis of tax issues. In addition, both in his writings and in the talks I heard him give, he had the rare ability not only to teach all of us in the tax world but to do so in a witty, engaging, and delightful manner. I will miss him for both his wit and his wisdom in generously sharing his brilliance with the rest of us. Each of the past several years, and probably every year until I retire, I will quote Marty on the first day of Federal Income Tax to the effect that "Federal Income Tax is the only truly humorous course in law school," in an attempt to get the students to let go of their fears and engage the subject.

Roberta Mann (Oregon):

Marty represented the taxpayer in my first adverse conference at the IRS, as a young docket attorney in Corporate. I wondered if the deferential attitude of my superiors towards Marty was the usual tone set by government attorneys towards taxpayer's counsel (No.) Later, when I was teaching at Georgetown as an adjunct, I attended a reception for faculty, and spied Marty across the room. I charged over to greet him and bask in his wisdom. My husband asked, "aren't you going to say hello to the Justice?" In my tax nerdiness, I had shoved Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg aside to greet my hero. His speech in accepting the ABA Tax Section Distinguished Service Award is my all-time favorite. As I recall, he started with something like, "Perhaps you are all wondering why I am receiving this award, as my entire practice has consisted of making wealthy people wealthier. Like all good things, it is because of my wife." I'm sure that you can find the precise quote, but I prefer to remember it this way.

Elliott Manning (Miami):

It is hard to figure out how to begin writing about Marty. We met more than fifth years ago at Harvard Law School when he returned from the military stint that interrupted his law school career after the first year. During the next two years, we took the same tax classes, including the Ernie Brown seminar., and studied together for both, including commiserating about our seminar papers. In addition, I officially edited Ruth's contribution to the Supreme Court note on Libson Shops, or, more accurately co-edited. During the two years, I also had more than one opportunity to sample Marty's famous cooking talents, and to meet the three year old Carol. We started practice in New York, at the same time, at different firms, but my practice was interrupted by a six month army reserve stint. During that time Marty started, and dropped out of, the NYU LLM program on the ground that it would take two years to cover what we already had, and that by that time Ted Tannenwald would have taught him the rest. We served together on various NYSBA Tax Section projects, etc. We also visited at Stanford Law School in Spring 1978, on sabbaticals from our respective firms. Indeed, Marty's sabbatical, which enabled him to be with Ruth who had a fellowship at the Hoover Institute, was negotiated in part on the basis of mine. There was some kind of virus in the air, because it inspired both of us to go into academia. Marty made it a year before me, largely because I was delayed by family issues. We also spent ten years together on the CCH, Tax Transactions Library Board, which led to his (and Jack Levin's) Mergers and Acquisitions volume(s). Marty conceived the idea for the tax transactions libary and assembled a great group of tas experts, and served as an extremely effective chair, but his timing was off. The project was essentially killed by the early '90s recession and by changes in the tax publishing business, but, of course, the mergers and acquisitions volumes lived on.

Since I cannot really add anything to what has been and will be said about his magnificent sense of humor, and ability to come up with the right phrase at the right time, I will leave it there. We will all miss him and not see his like again.

P.S. I notice in the item in the Miami Herald and others that Marty is referred to as Ruth's husband. Marty would have relished that. He often referred to himself as an American member of the Dennis Thatcher Society.

James Maule (Villanova):

Most tax law professors’ names – other than those in whose classes I sat -- came into my brain (whether through my eyes or ears) when I began teaching, though some had registered on account of research for articles I wrote before I began to teach. Marty Ginsburg’s name was one of very few whose name was uttered while I was still a student, by someone teaching a tax class. I thought it was remarkable that one tax law professor would refer to another tax law professor in glowing terms, though I’ve since come to understand why. Marty Ginsburg was one of those special tax lawyers turned tax law professor who brought practical insights into his teaching, never lost touch with his client experience roots, and contributed in countless ways to a better tax law education world and a tax practice world. If there were a tax law professor Hall of Fame, he would be in it. He would, I’m sure, laugh at both the idea of a tax law professor Hall of Fame and at the suggestion that he be in it. That’s the way he was, and his departure is our loss.

Joel Newman (Wake Forest):

In the summer of 2008, I team taught a comparative tax course in Venice with Marty Ginsburg, while my colleague, Suzanne Reynolds, team taught with his wife, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

It was a delight to teach with Marty; the students and I learned a great deal. It was an even greater delight to get to know the Ginsburgs as a couple. Marty teased his wife, constantly. For her part, she would occasionally smirk, and, on at least one occasion, jabbed him with her elbow.

Dean Morant and his wife spent some time in Venice while the Ginsburgs were there. Before he arrived, Dean Morant e-mailed to ask me to invite the Ginsburgs to have dinner with them. I happened to see Marty, sitting alone, and told him, “The Morants would like to have dinner with you on Wednesday.” “That’s fine,” Marty said, “but what about my wife?”

According to Marty, his wife was a world-class shopper. One day, my wife and I were walking toward the Piazza San Marco, and met the Ginsburgs coming the other way. “Don’t bother going to Ferragamos’s,” Marty warned. “Ruth just left, and she cleaned out the place.”

At dinner one evening, Justice Ginsburg complimented my wife, Jane, on her pendant. There was a story behind that pendant, so we told it. Jane and I were in the North Carolina mountains, some 85 miles from our home. She admired the pendant in an antique store, and I urged her to buy it. She wouldn’t. She said that it was enough to admire it in the store. The next time she was out of town, I drove back to the mountains and bought it for her. The Ginsburgs listened in silence. Then, Marty turned to his wife and said, “Ruth, you know that I would never do anything like that for you.” What made it so funny is that that was exactly the sort of thing that Marty would have done for his wife.

It was a privilege to spend time with an amazing tax lawyer and tax teacher. It was even more profound, however, to watch the interaction of a truly amazing couple.

Robert Peroni (Texas):

I have had the great pleasure to spend time with Marty in various settings over the past 20 years, including briefly as his faculty colleague when I was a visitor at Georgetown during the Fall 2009 semester. He was a remarkable human being in all respects and we have truly lost a giant in the tax law field. He will be sorely missed by all who had the chance to spend any time with him whether in a professional or personal setting. I am sure he is now entertaining his fellow occupants in Heaven with his great wit and sense of humor. I extend my deepest condolences to Justice Ginsburg and to the other members of Marty’s family.

Randle Pollard (Widener):

During my attendance at Georgetown University Law Center (GULC) in the late 1980’s, I made every effort to avoid taking Professor Ginsburg’s tax classes. Professor Ginsburg had the reputation of being the “hardest” professor at GULC and I allowed peer pressure to sway me from taking his classes (I took my tax classes from other professors). In my later years, I learned what I missed by not having been taught “tax” by such a fine professor. Rest in peace and God bless Professor Marty Ginsburg.

Toni Robinson (Quinnipiac):

When I was a law student at Columbia, I was a research assistant to Professor George Cooper. George was, at the time, writing a book on how high-income taxpayers passed large amounts of wealth on to subsequent generations without the imposition of tax. I and my fellow research assistant conducted many interviews on our own. But, George joined us for interviews with a few of the top tax lawyers in New York. One of them was Marty. I was amazed at his willingness to share his “secrets,” knowing that they would become public. His demonstration of an interest in good tax policy, even though revealing his techniques might lead to changes in the law, was an important lesson to an aspiring tax lawyer. That meeting with Marty, in part, led me to active membership in the Tax Section of the ABA, where lawyers, like Marty, often put their interests in the law above their financial interests in maintaining strategies for clients.

Adam Rosenzweig (Washington University):

Although I did not know him as well as I wish I had, Marty Ginsburg was a great teacher and inspiration to me, as well a generous supporter of my career. I almost missed out on one of the better experiences of my law school career – taking Marty Ginsburg’s Structuring Venture Capital and Private Equity course – due to the immense reputation which preceded him at Georgetown. Marty was renowned for being one of the most thoughtful, entertaining and funny professors at Georgetown while also being one of the most difficult, intimidating and challenging. Due (in part) to my fear of the latter, I had not taken a course with Marty until my third year, at which time I fortunately decided to take the risk and enroll in his course. It was in this class where I learned the true elegance of structuring a transaction to navigate the shoals of not only the tax law, but also securities law, bankruptcy law, contract law, ERISA, and others, as well as the unique skills and value that a lawyer can bring to a transaction.

To this day, I carry two distinct memories from Marty’s class: first, “there is always a way” … meaning that a good lawyer should always be able to find a way to resolve a legal issue, and second, never try to win a battle of wits with Marty Ginsburg. I am still not sure which was the more valuable lesson. Marty’s humor was legendary, and I remember to this day how it could be supportive and acerbic, sarcastic and inspiring, all at the same time. The stories about his experiences with Ross Perot and the GM/EDS tracking stock and horizontal double dummy transactions, among others, exposed me to a world of the law that I had never before conceived was possible.

Marty was instrumental in helping my career by agreeing to act as a reference for me on multiple occasions, although he may have never appreciated just how much so. It soon became abundantly clear that one word from Marty Ginsburg opened doors that might have otherwise been closed. He advised me on tax practice in New York when I was deciding where to begin my career as an associate out of law school. Later, when I was beginning to consider entering academia, I asked Marty what he thought it took to be a good scholar and teacher; he answered in typical fashion that he didn’t know since he was “just” a tax lawyer. When I began as a Visiting Assistant Professor at Northwestern I sent him an email thanking him for his help obtaining the position and promptly received a response thanking me for writing him such a thoughtful note. When I was asked on the law professor hiring market which teacher of mine I would like to emulate, my answer was Marty Ginsburg. I continue to aspire to this goal.

In my experience Marty Ginsburg was truly a brilliant, witty, and inspiring teacher and lawyer. I am honored to have been a student of his, and the legal community has suffered a great loss with his passing.

Deborah Schenk (NYU):

As everyone will note, Marty was a giant. Among Marty's many contributions to the tax law were his efforts on behalf of tax simplification. Unlike many of us, Marty actually had a major effect. He was the driving force behind the Subchapter S Simplification Act as well as the Installment Sale Simplification Act. Marty visited at NYU the semester that Ruth's appointment to the Court was being considered. Although I had many enjoyable conversations with Marty from which I learned a lot about triangular mergers and the like, I was struck most by his devotion to his family. He worked tirelessly to promote Ruth's appointment and turned us all into cheerleaders for the cause. Whenever the subject of his children came up, perhaps by mentioning an article of Jane's that I had seen, he acknowledged her success, but promptly told me about James' latest recording. And of course I laughed more that semester than perhaps any other. His wit and wisdom will be sorely missed.

David Shakow (Pennsylvania):

Marty had an incredibly encyclopedic knowledge of tax law and authorities, subject to instant recall, which would surely have excited envy if displayed by someone else. But you couldn't feel negatively about Marty for two reasons, at least. First, he was a very nice man, and that became obvious to anyone who spent the briefest time with him. Second, he was very generous. I remember sitting in on a talk Marty was giving to a group at the IRS on tax straddles, an issue I had been working on at Treasury. In the middle of the talk, Marty turned to me to explain some aspect of the tax straddle structure. The memory of Marty needing me to explain something warmed my heart for months, until I woke up one day and realized that Marty undoubtedly could have explained it himself--he was just finding a friendly way to be nice to me.

Marty also had an incredibly practical approach to tax issues. I sat in once on an ALI project's discussion of net operating losses. The issue on the table was allowing refundability of NOLs. Stanley Surrey was there, and he was pained at the prospect but hadn't found a way to convince the advocates of the error of their ways. Marty took a direct approach. He said, basically, "let me at 'em." In other words, he didn't bother to worry through the niceties of the proposal. He basically warned those in favor of the idea that, no matter how well they thought they could draft a provision, the tax bar would find a way to exploit the proposal to achieve unintended consequences.

Marty was the sort of person you were always happy to see, and he made it clear that he was happy to see you too. He was irrepressible and irreplaceable.

Deborah Schenk (NYU):

 

Daniel Shaviro (NYU):

I was very saddened by the news of Marty's death, though I had known he was ill. Truly a wonderful and lovely man (gentle, ironic, appreciative of life), as well as a preeminent and brilliant legal scholar from a different era.

He was a delightful colleague for a semester at Chicago many years ago, although I suspect the students still have nightmares thinking about the final exam he gave. (I thought it was pretty challenging.) Then again, he probably graded it gently.

In Tax I, I always mention his article "The Leaky Tax Shelter," along with his pretended initial tax shelter idea, which was something like: "Give me your money and I'll run off to Mexico, then you can simply claim a loss deduction!" (Leaving aside 165 limits et al -- but the point he was making, of course, was that the key to a tax shelter is NOT actually suffering the losses you deduct.)

Please visit Georgetown web page, In Memory of Professor Martin D. Ginsburg. In lieu of flowers, donations in Marty's memory may be made to:

The Chicago Classical Recording Foundation (CCRF)
1205 West Balmoral Avenue
Chicago, IL 60640

Above the Law Reviews Dan Shaviro's Novel

I previously blogged (here and here) the new novel by Tax Prof Daniel N. Shaviro (NYU), Getting It (iUniverse, 2010).  Above the Law today hsa a review of the book along with an interview with Dan.  Here is the opening:

If you’re the type who is convinced that the people you work with in Biglaw are evil, conniving, and ready to stab you in the back with a really sharp highlighter, you will love Getting It, a novel by Daniel Shaviro. In a post titled “james joyce meets the paper chase,” an Amazon reviewer says: “If Joyce or Kafka had worked at Arnold and Porter, this would be their book.”

I’ve read a lot of lawyer fiction, but never something quite like this. The satirical novel is populated with sadistic partners and scheming associates competing for partnership, including the caddish Bill Doberman, dopey Arnold Portner, and self-involved Lowell Stellworth. It’s an “American Psycho” take on Biglaw — funny and fast-paced, a great summer quick read. I devoured it on a plane to Chicago.

Pat Cain's Role in the IRS Ruling on California Gay/Lesbian Couples

Following up my recent posts:

• IRS  California Registered Domestic Partners Can Split Income and Tax Withholding 50/50 Without Adverse Gift Tax Consequences (June 2, 2010)
• WSJ:  Gay Couples Get Equal Tax Treatment (June 6, 2010)

Don Read, the tax lawyer for the California gay couple that obtained the IRS ruling, wants to share with the broader tax community the role played by Tax Prof Pat Cain (Santa Clara):

In November 2004, [Pat] and I contacted the Office of Tax Legislative Counsel to request that the Tax Policy office urge the IRS to issue a public revenue ruling consistent with this private ruling so that registered domestic partners could plan their tax affairs and tax preparers could know how to prepare their returns. When that went nowhere, she and I worked together on a private ruling request that was filed in April 2005. Although Chief Counsel staff attorneys who conferred with me during the process seemed favorable to our position, there was no formal response to that request until April 2007, when the Service declined to rule one way or the other “in the interests of general tax administration.” In the meantime, of course, the Service had issued CCA 200608038, which should have made an adverse private ruling almost automatic (although the Service didn’t know how to explain how, from a tax perspective, income belonging to one partner for tax purposes ended up being half owned by the other partner). Pat and I began thinking about how the client would file his return consistently with the 2006 CCA and then file a claim for refund and, if unsuccessful, file suit for refund in the US District Court for the Northern District of California. But after the 2008 election of President Obama and the 2009 White House website declaration of controlled support for the GLBT community, it seemed propitious to try the private ruling approach again. Pat always imparted her deep knowledge and wise guidance in the process, which now has ended pretty successfully. She was always ready to enlist broader support from her academic colleagues

I don’t know how acknowledgments are handled in the academic world, but I would like you to know and to ask you to let your colleagues know, how much I appreciate being Pat’s colleague in this endeavor. We in the Bay Area are lucky to have won her from Iowa and Texas.

Nicholas Mirkey Receives Humanitarian Award

Tax Prof Nicholas A. Mirkay (Widener) was recently honored with the Red Ribbon Humanitarian Award, given by the Delaware HIV Consortium at its sixth-annual WOW Awards Celebration:

The awards event recognizes corporate and individual excellence for philanthropy, volunteerism, fundraising and community leadership in the field of HIV/AIDS. The humanitarian award in particular recognizes an individual who is dedicated to improving the consortium and the community by volunteering his or her services and talents.

San Diego Honors Les Snyder Today

The University of San Diego School of Law Tax Law Society is hosting a Spring Mixer today in honor of Lester B. Snyder for his contributions USD and its tax program. Karen C. Burke, M. Carr Ferguson, and Richard C. Pugh will deliver remarks.  From Les's faculty web page:

A specialist in tax law, Professor Lester B. Snyder came from the University of Connecticut to USD where he served as director of the Graduate Tax Program from 1983 to 1989. He has also been a visiting professor at New York University and Boston University. For nearly 20 years, he was editor-in-chief of the Journal of Real Estate Taxation. He was the first professor-in-residence in the Tax Division of the U.S. Department of Justice. ...  Snyder was a recipient of the 2003 Bernard E. Witkin Award for excellence in teaching from the San Diego Law Library Justice Foundation.

Update: Webcast here.

Tax Teachers of the Year

The AALS has announced that the following Tax Profs have been selected as the Teachers of the Year for 2008-09 at their respective law schools:

• Mitchell M. Gans (Hofstra)
• Thomas D. Griffith (USC)
• Lily Kahng (Seattle)
• Kirk J. Stark (UCLA)
• Lee-ford Tritt (Florida)
• Larry D. Ward (Iowa)

Bryan Camp Wins Texas Outstanding Law Review Article Award

Protecting Trust Assets from the Federal Tax Lien, 1 Est. Plan. & Community Prop. L.J. 295 (2009), by Bryan Camp (Texas Tech), has been selected as the Texas Bar Foundation’s Outstanding Law Review Article for 2009. The award is presented annually to designate the most important and best-written legal article published in Texas.  From the Texas Tech press release: 

“This is a tremendous achievement for the Texas Tech School of Law,” said Walt Huffman, dean of the school. “Winning this prestigious statewide award is difficult; winning the award with a tax law article is truly exceptional. Professor Camp’s brilliant subject-matter, expertise in tax law and his ability to effectively share that expertise through the written word deserves the recognition.”

The Paul R. McDaniel International Tax Scholarship

I previously blogged the sad news that Paul McDaniel, James J. Freeland Eminent Scholar in Taxation and Professor of Law at the University of Florida Levin College of Law, is seriously ill with stage IV mesothelioma.  Marty McMahon, Paul's long-time friend and colleague, presented Paul with a plaque announcing the Paul R. McDaniel International Tax Scholarship:

Paul, on behalf of your colleagues at the University of Florida Graduate Tax Program, your students, and your friends, I want to present you with this plaque to commemorate the founding of the Paul R. McDaniel International Tax Scholarship at the University of Florida College of Law, an endowed fund that will support scholarships for international tax students and international tax scholars to come and participate in the International Tax Program. We are eternally grateful for your contributions to the Graduate Tax Program, particularly the International Tax Program, and for the enrichment of our lives and our careers that you have brought to us. Thank you very much.

The plaque reads: "In Honor of PAUL R. MCDANIEL ~ inspirational teacher and scholar ~ his colleagues, students, and friends have established THE PAUL R. MCDANIEL INTERNATIONAL TAX SCHOLARSHIP at the University of Florida College of Law."

Grayson McCouch Named Endowed Professor at San Diego

Grayson McCouch has been named the 2010-2011 Class of 1975 Endowed Professor at San Diego.  From the press release:

The award was established by the Class of 1975 at its 25-year reunion gift to the law school to recognize meritorious teaching, leadership and academic accomplishments of a professor in the School of Law.

Before joining the USD faculty, Professor McCouch was a professor at the University of Miami School of Law. He clerked for Judge Hugh H. Bownes on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit and practiced law with firms in Boston and Minneapolis. He was a research fellow at the European University Institute in Florence, Italy, and at the Max Planck Institute in Munich, Germany. McCouch teaches and writes primarily in the areas of wills, trusts and taxation. His recent publications include The Empty Promise of Estate Tax Repeal, Probate Law Reform and Nonprobate Transfers, and COBRA Strikes Back: Anatomy of a Tax Shelter (with Professor Karen Burke). He is co-author (with B. Bittker and E. Clark) of a leading casebook on federal estate and gift taxation. McCouch is a member of the American Law Institute.

Cliff Fleming Named Fulbright Distinguished Chair at Vienna

From a BYU press release:

J. Clifton Fleming, Jr., holder of the Ernest L. Wilkinson Chair at the J. Reuben Clark Law School, has been appointed to the Fulbright Distinguished Chair in the Department of Public Law and Tax Law at the Vienna University of Economics and Business Administration, Vienna, Austria, for the 2011 winter semester. He will teach a course in U.S. international taxation and a seminar for doctoral students. (Distinguished Chairs are viewed as among the most prestigious appointments in the Fulbright Scholar program.)

Tony Infanti Wins Chancellor’s Teaching Award

Tax Prof Anthony Infanti has reveived a 2010 Chancellor’s Distinguished Teaching Award from the University of Pittsburgh:

In making the award, the selection committee noted his innovation in developing teaching methods appropriate to different course contexts and aligned with the professional goals of his students, as well as his significant work with students on moot court competitions and the Pittsburgh Tax Review.

(Hat Tip: Bridget Crawford.)

Paul McDaniel

It is with heavy hearts that Jim Repetti and I share the news that our friend, mentor, and co-author Paul McDaniel, James J. Freeland Eminent Scholar in Taxation and Professor of Law at the University of Florida Levin College of Law, is seriously ill with stage IV mesothelioma. We join Paul’s wife Ginny and family in fervently praying for Paul.

By any reckoning, Paul is one of the most influential tax scholars and teachers of the past 50 years. Paul’s signal scholarly achievement among his fifty law review articles and ten books is his pioneering work on tax expenditure analysis with Stanley Surrey, culminating in their 1985 Harvard University Press book, Tax Expenditures. Paul has influenced generations of tax students with his six casebooks (Federal Income Taxation, Federal Income Taxation of Business Organizations, Federal Income Taxation of Corporations, Federal Income Taxation of Partnerships and S Corporations, Federal Wealth Transfer Taxation, and Introduction to United States International Taxation).

For us, being asked to join Paul as a co-author was one of the proudest (and most intimidating) moments of our careers. In working with Paul, we have been repeatedly struck by his encyclopedic knowledge of the tax law, clear yet elegant prose, and organizational genius. But what stands out most for us has been Paul’s incredible grace and patience in nurturing two junior co-authors struggling to match the high standards he set in prior editions. Jim is especially grateful to have also benefitted from Paul’s tutelage as his student at Boston College Law School and later as his colleague at Hill & Barlow and Boston College.

We had to convince a reluctant Paul to allow us to share this news with his many friends and admirers in the tax community. We know you will appreciate the opportunity to send Paul your best wishes and to let him know what he has meant to you. We will print the comments received to this post in a book for Paul and his family.

Tax Prof Nominees for Best Law Teachers in America

Following up on my prior post, Nominate a Tax Prof for Best Law Teachers in America:  Michael Hunter Schwartz (Washburn) has released the list of 150 nominees for inclusion in his forthcoming book, What the Best Law Teachers Do (Harvard University Press, 2011).  Here are the Tax Prof nominees:

• Howard E. Abrams (Emory):

Professor Abrams has the unique ability to make a class as dry as personal income tax one that is engaging and even entertaining. He has an expansive knowledge of background cases and their underlying issues and presents them in a way that really clarifies the cases at hand. Further, he seems to know about every case in existence as, when someone asks a question, he normally knows of a case where the taxpayer asked the same question. In all, his teaching style is unabashed, humorous, enthralling, and most importantly: effective.

• Dennis A. Calfee (Florida):

Prof. Calfee has the best teaching style for tax law: he makes the students read the tax code ("out loud and with feeling!") and then teaches them to interpret, emphasizing the importance of punctuation, style, and format. In a world where placement of periods versus commas can make the difference, this is vital. Prof. Calfee also leads his classes into forays into the more interesting and esoteric concepts of tax law, where core concepts butt heads with practicality. The skills learned in Prof. Calfee's classes have long-lasting utility for his students who pursue tax careers. Most importantly, Prof. Calfee's enthusiasm for the subject matter is surpassed by his enthusiasm for the students. He always has time for students, be it to help with their particular tax code struggles, to advise on a job search, or to just listen. As law school communities grow larger and more corporate, that personal touch is invaluable.

• Bridget J. Crawford (Pace):

Professor Crawford has won the "Outstanding Professor of the Year" award at Pace for the past three years. One student described her teaching by saying, "I have never met a person with more energy or enthusiasm for her work. When you leave her class, you are wowed by her immense commitment to providing the necessary knowledge to her students, not just related to the given area taught that day, but also with regard to the underlying issues in every case or policy issue . . .Her door is always open to everyone." Another student said, "Professor Crawford stands out as an amazing professor because she has this great ability to turn staid topics into exciting energetic lectures. She also breaks down complex legal concepts into understandable pieces in a way that makes us all wonder why we were confused in the first place."

• Edward A. Morse (Creighton):

Professor Morse is an exceptional teacher. First, he has an incredibly deep understanding of the tax law. Second, he has a true passion for the subject matter he teaches and is able to instill that passion and interest in his students. Third, is a very well respected professor. The first thing that strike as a student of Professor Morse is that he truly knows 'his tax stuff.' He doesn't just know the answers to the problems he has assigned and merely recite that limited bit of information when teaching. He takes you beyond the shallow water of superficial explanations and gives you a deep, well rounded understanding of the complicated principles of tax law. When sitting in Prof. Morse's Taxation of Business enterprise class, each day I was truly impressed with how excited he seemed to be able to teach our class. You could tell he truly enjoyed the subject matter and wanted his class to understand the concepts and develop the same level of interest. His enthusiasm along with his positive reinforcement which he provided his students when they didn't quite grasp a concept, he me realize that I too could learn and someday practice in this complex area of law.

• Stanley D. Neeleman (BYU):

Prof. Neeleman does not confine his tax course to a case book. He has developed additional problems to flesh out the relevant cases and code sections. Instead of using the traditional Socratic method while reviewing a case he uses the Socratic method with the problems. The problems create a teaching opportunity and are not merely short cuts to dispense the black letter law. The problems are usually not simple and require applying common law, relevant code sections, and previously covered materials. In addition, the problems usually have multiple parts and each part adds an additional layer of complexity. Prof. Neeleman is also a well-spring of legal ethics. Not only does he teach what is permissible under the law, but he also points out what permissible behavior is not necessarily ethical. It is refreshing to have a teacher that doesn't just teach what you can get away with. Finally, the fascinating thing about Prof. Neeleman is that even though he brings his case book and tax code supplement to class, he never opens them. It is all in his head. He remembers every detail about the cases, about his own problems, and the code text. Amazing!

• Sergio Pareja (New Mexico):

Professor Pareja]'s courses require students to actively learn material. His teaching style incorporates problem-based learning, quizzes, written exercises, class participation, student teaching of material, along with his own creative and practice-based presentation of materials. His courses are rigorous and challenge students to grapple with new material in a way that ensures they understand and are able to apply the material. Student comments regarding [his] teaching demonstrate that he is well-regarded by his students for his high expectations of their performances. Because of his teaching, several students have decided upon tax as their area of concentration and practice, a decision which even surprised some of them.

• David M. Schizer (Dean, Columbia):

Dean Schizer is an outstanding person as well as lecturer. He displays tremendous respect for his students. His clarity of teaching as well as his ability to draw the students into discussion made him by far the best professor I had at Columbia. What was particularly interesting is that he has a strong tax focus, which is not known as the most engaging of topics. Nevertheless, Dean Schizer's classes are always full and well attended. Despite his outstanding intellect, Dean Schizer is very approachable. His natural humility marks him as an exceptional human being.

• David I. Walker (Boston University):

Professor Walker teaches Corporations and Tax to huge numbers of students, many of whom say they refuse to take these courses from anyone else. Her gets near perfect evaluations in Tax, of all things, even while teaching sections of over 100. He maintains his reputation as an extremely humane professor even while working his students as hard as anyone in the school."

Nominations remain open and will be accepted through March 30, 2010.

The All-Decade State Tax Team

David Brunori today announced his 15-person All-Decade State Tax Team (55 State Tax Notes 127 (Jan. 11, 2010)), which includes three Tax Profs:

• Walter Hellerstein (Georgia)
• Richard D. Pomp (Connecticut)
• John A. Swain (Arizona)

Galle Receives Honorable Mention in AALS Scholarly Paper Competition

Brian D. Galle (Florida State) received honorable mention in the 2010 AALS Scholarly Paper Competition for his paper, Foundation or Empire? The Role of Charity in a Federal System, 88 Tex. L. Rev. ___ (2010). Brian will present the paper at the AALS Annual Meeting on Friday, January 8, at 4:00 p.m.  Here is the abstract:

This Article critiques the prevailing justification for subsidies for the charitable sector, and suggests a new alternative. According to contemporary accounts, charity corrects the failure of the private market to provide public goods, and further corrects the failure of government to provide goods other than those demanded by the median voter.

However, the claim that government can meet the needs only of a single “median voter” neglects both federalism and public choice theory. Citizens dissatisfied with the services of one government can move to or even create another. Alternatively, they may use the threat of exit to lobby for local change. Subsidies for charity inefficiently distort the operation of these markets for legal rules.

Nonetheless, there remains a strong case for subsidizing charity, albeit on grounds new to the literature. Charity serves as gap-filler when federalism mechanisms break down. For example, frictions on exit produce too little jurisdictional competition, and excessively easy exit produces too much competition - a race to the bottom. At the same time, competition from government constrains inefficient charities. Thus, charity and government each perform best as complements to the other.

Finally, this Article sketches the normative legal consequences of these claims. Most significantly, I respond to the claims by Malani and Posner that for-profit charity would be superior to current arrangements. That suggestion would fatally weaken competition between charity and government, defeating the only persuasive purpose for charitable subsidies.

Allison Christians Named Teacher of the Year at Wisconsin

Tax Prof Allison Christians has been named Teacher of the Year at Wisconsin.  From the press release:

Allison Christians was chosen Teacher of the Year from among all eligible tenure-track professors at the Law School by a poll of the three most recent classes (excluding the graduating class). Christians joined the law faculty in 2005, after practicing tax law at Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz in New York City. She has written several articles and book chapters addressing national and international policy, globalization, competition, institutional, and development aspects of taxation and is co-author of a leading casebook on U.S. international tax law.

• Law in Action
• Interview

Repetti Delivers Inaugural Kenealy Lecture at BC

James R. Repetti delivered the inaugural William J. Kenealy Lecture at Boston College.  From the press release:

A leading tax scholar, Repetti's lecture explored the role of economic analysis in determining the future of our tax system. Repetti noted that concerns about fairness, administrability and economic efficiency had traditionally played equal roles in the design of our tax system. In the past twenty years, however, concerns about economic efficiency appear to have become dominant in the debate about the best system. Professor Repetti argued that economic efficiency should not play a greater role in structuring our tax system than concerns about the system's fairness and administrability because the anticipated gains from economic efficiency are no more certain than gains associated with fairness and administrability. ...

Repetti was appointed as the first The Rev. William J. Kenealy, SJ, Professor at the start of this academic year. The Professorship is named in honor of the member of the Law School's first class who went on to serve as dean of the school from 1939-1956.

Gender, Race, and Age in SSRN Download Rankings

In our article, Ranking Law Schools: Using SSRN to Measure Scholarly Performance, 81 Ind. L.J. 83 (2006), Bernie Black and I noted that one of the advantages of SSRN download counts over the other faculty rankings measures (citation counts, publication counts, and reputation surveys) is that SSRN downloads favor younger scholars at improving law schools while the other measures favor more established scholars and schools.  We also noted that women and minorities are under-represented in SSRN download counts as they are in citation counts, publication counts, and reputation surveys, but speculated that the representation of women and minorities would improve in the future as they posted more papers on SSRN, particularly in the recent downloads measure.  We closed the article with case studies of the SSRN download rankings in our respective fields -- corporate and tax law (pp. 120-22).  The SSRN download data were from August 2005.  The chart below compares that data with the most recent tax download data (September 2009) on gender, race, and age:

	Top 25 All-Time Downloads		Top 25 Recent Downloads
	2005	2009	2005	2009
% Women	16%	20%	20%	39%
% Men	84%	80%	80%	61%
% Minority	8%	4%	0%	0%
% White	92%	96%	100%	100%
Mean Age	47.0	47.6	45.4	46.3
Median Age	47.0	48.0	44.5	47.0

Earlier this year, I asked Why Do Female Tax Profs Do Better in the SSRN Rankings Than Their Nontax Counterparts?.  The representation of women in the Top 25 has increased from 2005 to 2009 in both all-time (4 percentage points) and recent (19) downloads.  However, the representation of minorities has decreased in all-time downloads (4) downloads and has stayed at 0 in recent downloads (based on self reporting in the AALS listing of minority law teachers).

On the age front, Tax Profs in the Top 25 of the SSRN download rankings in both 2005 (all time: 47.0 mean, 47.0 median; recent: 45.4 mean, 44.5 median) and 2009 (all time: 47.6 mean, 48.0 median; recent: 46.3 mean, 47.0 median) are much younger than Tax Profs (55 mean, 54 median) and law professors (53 mean, 52 median) generally.  Eric A. Lustig, Who We Are: An Empirical Study of the Tax Law Professoriate, 1 Pitt. Tax Rev. 85 (2003) (2001 AALS data).  However, the mean and median ages have increased from 2005 to 2009 in both download categories -- all-time (0.6 mean, 1.0 median) and recent (0.9 mean, 2.5 median) downloads.

Top 100 Most Influential People in Tax and Accounting

I am honored to be included on the list of  Accounting Today's Top 100 Most Influential People for the fourth year in a row. The magazine contains one-sentence explanations of why each of the folks made the list; here is mine:

Caron has built the leading tax blog on the Internet, with over 10 million page views since he created it in 2004.

I am flattered to be on the list with such high-powered people in the tax and accounting worlds, including:

Politicans:

• Sen. Max Baucus (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)
• Rep. Barney Frank (Chair, House Financial Services Committee)
• Sen. Chuck Grassley (Ranking Member, Senate Finance Committee)
• President Barack Obama
• Rep. Charles Rangel (Chair, House Ways & Means Committee)

Government and Industry Group Officials:

• Robert Attmore (Chair, GASB)
• Ben Bernanke (Chair, Federal Reserve System) 
• Timothy Geithner (Secretary of the Treasury)
• J. Russell George (Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration)
• Robert Harris (Incoming Chair, AICPA)
• Karen Hawkins (Director, IRS Office of Professional Responsibility)
• Robert Herz (Chair, FASB)
• James Kroeker (Chief Accountant, SEC)
• Barry Melancon (President & CEO, AICPA)
• Nina Olson (National Taxpayer Advocate, IRS)
• Thomas Sadler (Chair, NASBA)
• Mary Schapiro (Chair, SEC)
• Douglas Shulman (Commissioner, IRS)
• David Tweedie (Chair, IASB)
• Edward Yingling (Chair, ABA)

CEOs of Major Accounting Firms:

• Timothy Flynn & John Veihmeyer (KPMG)
• Robert Moritz & Dennis Nally (PriceWaterhouseCoopers)
• Edward Nusbaum (Grant Thornton)
• James Quigley & Barry Salzberg (Deloitte)
• James Turley (Ernst & Young)

CEOs of Tax & Accounting Companies & Publishers:

• Jonathan Baron (Thomson Reuters Tax & Accounting)
• Kevin Robert (Wolters Kluwer)
• Mike Sabbatis (CCH)
• Brad Smith (Intuit)
• Russ Smyth (H&R Block)

For more, see Accounting Today's List of Top 100 People Is Kinda Predictable.

A Seating Chart Tee Shirt

As one who has difficulty learning my students' names each year, I may follow the approach Jack Bogdanski (Lewis & Clark) has taken this fall with his Income Tax class:

This is an improvement on his prior clothing effort, and I am sure his students are grateful that he covered this up.

Law Prof Charged With Tax Evasion Claims ADD as Defense

From Jonathan Turley (George Washington):

Minnesota prosecutors have charged Hamline University professor Robin Magee with 11 felony counts for failing to file tax returns and filing false returns. In addition to to criminal law, tax law is one of Magee’s specialties and she also practices as a tax lawyer.

Prosecutors allege that Magee failed to file her state tax returns for 2004 through 2006 until this year, never filed for 2007, and underpaid her taxes by $5,000. The government also charges that Magee claimed eight exemptions, even though she is single and has no dependents. ... 

Magee reportedly claimed that she failed to file her tax returns because she has extreme attention deficit disorder, though if true that makes her work on the taxes of others a bit difficult to square. ... On her faculty page, she writes:

“I believe, as the founders of this country espoused, that the greatest threat to law and order, peace and liberty is tyranny, not crime. I, therefore, believe that the highest calling of the lawyer is the call to fight against tryanny and government-sponsored or tolerated oppression. Thus, I struggle in my classes to instill in my students the knowledge of the law and the critical and analytical skills to hold the government (and everyone else) accountable to the rule of law and the rights of all people.”

See also ABA Journal, Minneapolis Star Tribune, Roth & Co.

Death of Susan Kalinka

Tax Prof Susan Kalinka, the Harriet S. Daggett-Frances Leggio Landry Professor of Law at the LSU Paul M. Hebert Law Center, died this morning.  She was 60 years old.  From LSU Chancellor Jack M. Weiss:

Professor Kalinka was an exceptional teacher and scholar of tax law. She inspired dozens of students to seek specialized degrees in tax law and to pursue careers in that field. She was passionate about her work and about her students. She will be missed greatly and remembered fondly.

Update #1:   From Susan's tax colleague, Chris Pietruszkiewicz, Vice Chancellor - Business and Financial Affairs & J.Y. Sanders Professor of Law at LSU:

I am saddened to report that Professor Susan Kalinka passed early this morning after a sudden illness. Susan joined the LSU faculty in 1988 and, for 20 years, has only ever had one passion – students. Some people have a personality that others want to follow but Susan had much more than that, building a tax program in which over 90% of our students enroll in at least one tax class despite its absence from the Louisiana Bar Exam. She not only encouraged tax students to apply for LL.M. programs, but she funded their application fees, sending over 35 students to tax LL.M. programs in the last five years. Without fanfare, she devoted countless hours to the Baton Rouge community with her VITA program.

Her gift was inspiring students and, we are enormously thankful for everything that she did and everything that she represents. As a colleague for nine years, I gained a mentor – and a friend, one who created a fantastic place to be a tax professor. Two decades of students had the benefit of the kindness and dedication of Professor Mom and, while we are very sorry to see her pass so early in life, we celebrate her life as a colleague, teacher, mentor, and, most importantly, a wonderful person.

Update #2:  From the LSU press release:

Professor Kalinka had been diagnosed recently with cancer. She had been undergoing treatment for only a few weeks, and her condition deteriorated rapidly over the weekend.

Family members have asked that colleagues, students, alumni, and friends send written comments regarding Professor Kalinka and her teaching career at LSU. Comments, photos, and personal remembrances may be sent to KalinkaCondolences@law.lsu.edu.

Albany Seeks to Hire Tax Clinician

Albany Law School invites applications for the position of Assistant Clinical Professor of Law in its Low Income Taxpayer Clinic:

This initial one year appointment involves teaching and supervision of law students who are learning to practice law in a client-centered manner. This is a grant funded position and continued employment beyond one year is contingent continuation of the grant. Subject to grant funding, this position may become a renewable long-term contract upon review after three years of continuing successful performance.

Applications (cover letter, resume and list of references) can be sent to Barbara Jordan-Smith.

Tax Profs For Judge Sotomayor

Columbia today released a letter signed by 1,200 law professors supporting the nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the U.S. Supreme Court.  Among the signatories are these Tax Profs:

• Nancy Abramowitz (American)
• Ellen Aprill (Loyola-L.A.)
• Reuven Avi-Yonah (Michigan)
• Karen Brown (George Washington)
• Noel Cunningham (NYU)
• Barbara Fried (Stanford)
• Brian Galle (Florida State)
• Wendy Gerzog (Baltimore)
• Roberta Mann (Oregon)
• Elena Marty-Nelson (Nova)
• Ajay Mehrotra (Indiana-Bloomington)
• Reginald Mombrun (North Carolina Central)
• Robert Peroni (Texas)
• William Popkin (Indiana-Bloomington)
• Mildred Robinson (Virginia)
• Richard Schmalbeck (Duke)
• Ted Seto (Loyola-L.A.)
• Joshua Tate (SMU)
• William Turnier (North Carolina)

Update:

• ABA Journal
• The Blog of the Legal Times

Susan Pace Hamill to Run for Alabama House Seat

Alabama Tax Prof Susan Pace Hamill announced yesterday that she is running for the House District 63 seat in the Alabama Legislature.  Tuscaloosa News: UA Law Professor Announces Bid for Legislature:

Hamill, a Democrat, on Wednesday listed the core principles that she said compelled her to seek public office. “I believe government must serve the weak equally as well as it serves the strong,” she told friends and supporters in front of Trinity Methodist Church. “I believe tax policy should be written not by those with the most lobbyists, but those with the greatest commitment to equity and fairness.

(Hat Tip:  Law School Headlines.)  Susan is best known for a series of pathbreaking articles applying Judeo-Christian principles to tax policy and for her strong condemnation of Alabama's tax system.

Update: For more, see the post by Susan's former colleague, Al Brophy (North Carolina), on The Faculty Lounge.

Ira Bloom Receives Service Excellence Award

Tax Prof Ira Bloom, Justice David Josiah Brewer Distinguished Professor of Law, received the Albany Law School 2009 Award for Excellence in Service.  From the Albany press release:

He has provided pro bono services for the past 10 years for the New York State Breast Cancer Support and Education Network, as well as for the Capital Region Action against Breast Cancer, and he has handled more than 20 cases for the Legal Aid Society of Northeastern New York. Professor Bloom also helped the Community Foundation of the Capital Region plan their recent symposium on Emerging Issues in Planning & Philanthropy.

Aprill Wins Dana Latham Award

Ellen P. Aprill (Loyola-L.A.) will receive the 2009 Dana Latham Award today from the Los Angeles County Bar Association for lifetime achievement in the field of tax law:

The award is given only in those years when the Executive Committee of the Taxation Section concludes that there is a then living leader of the Los Angeles tax bar who has made an outstanding contribution to the community and to the legal profession in the field of taxation. Generally, such service involves a broad participation in community and public service coupled with achievement as a leader on the Bench, in legal education, tax literature, or in practice as a lawyer, and may involve a combination of these factors.

The award is especially dear to Ellen, since she and her husband Sandy Holo (Musick, Peeler, Los Angeles) met through the LACBA Tax Section (she was chair and Sandy was on the Executive Committee).  Sandy won the award in 2006 -- Ellen and Sandy are the first couple to have both won the award in its 30+-year history.  Ellen is first law professor and third woman to win the award.

Lederman Wins Teaching Award at Indiana

Leandra Lederman (Indiana-Bloomingon) has won the Trustees Teaching Award:

Trustees Awards recognize excellence in teaching, and are awarded by a committee that reviews student and faculty nominations.

     

Beyer, Hatfield Win Teaching Awards at Texas Tech

Gerry W. Beyer (left) and Michael Hatfield (right) swept the 2009 Texas Tech Professor of the Year Awards:

• Prof. Beyer was selected the 2009 Outstanding First Yirst Professor of the Year by vote of the 1L students. (He also received the 2007 Outstanding Professor of the Year Award by vote of 1L, 2L, and 3L students.)  
• Prof. Hatfield was selected the 2009 Outstanding Advanced Professor of the Year by vote of the 2L and 3L students. (He also received the award in 2008.  In 2006, Professors Beyer and Hatfield shared the Outstanding Professor of the Year as selected by the 1L, 2L, and 3L students.)