Estate Planning

Wills Can Use Religious Tests

By Hull & Hull LLP

The Chicago Tribune provides an interesting commentary on a recent decision of the Illinois Supreme Court, which ruled that a Jewish couple could legally disinherit any grandchildren who married outside their faith, as long as the method of doing so did not encourage divorce. 

The facts giving rise to the case are that the husband discovered that his grandson was taking a gentile to the junior prom.  The husband wrote his strong feelings about religious loyalty into his Will.  Specifically, his Will indicated that upon his wife's death their grandchildren would become lifetime beneficiaries of certain trusts. However, if any of them married outside the faith and their non-Jewish spouse did not convert to Judaism within a year, they would not receive their share of the trusts.

The husband predeceased the wife. The wife came up with a slightly different approach in her Will.  She bequeathed $250,000 to the one grandchild who had married within the faith. Those who did not do so received nothing.  

One of the disinherited grandchildren argued that the clause violated public policy by offering money to practice a particular religion.  The court disagreed, pointing out that the wife did not set up a system that encouraged heirs to divorce and remarry to claim an inheritance.  Rather, she made a bequest to reward those grandchildren whose lives embraced the values she and her husband cherished.

Full post as published by Toronto Estate Law Blog on September 30, 2009 (boomark / email).