# Howard v. United States

> Tennessee Supreme Court · April 24, 1978 · 566 S.W.2d 521

URL: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9684613

## Case

- **Full name:** Laurence B. HOWARD, Jr., Petitioner (And Respondent), v. UNITED STATES of America, Respondent (And Petitioner) and William F. Howard, Trustee, Respondent
- **Court:** Tennessee Supreme Court
- **Decided:** April 24, 1978
- **Citations:** 566 S.W.2d 521; 1978 Tenn. LEXIS 553
- **Precedential status:** Published
- **Opinion:** On rehearing by Henry
- **Judges:** Brock, Henry, Fones, Cooper, Harbison
- **Cited by:** 26 later opinions in the Frix Law Library

## Citator (automated)

- No negative treatment found by the automated citator. That is not the same as a confirmation that the case is good law; read the citing cases.
- Full citator and citing cases: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9684613

## How later opinions describe it (automated extraction)

- finding that an “income beneficiary has a vested property right in the income generated by the trust.”
- describing the filing of a tax lien as a remedy for the collection of federal taxes

## Opinion text

OPINION ON PETITION TO REHEAR
HENRY, Chief Justice.
This cause is before the Court on the petition of Laurence B. Howard, Jr., for a rehearing.
Petitioner charges the Court with error in holding that the “Certificates of Assessments and payments were inadmissible”; 1 that the taxes in question were due; that the assessments were legally made; and that judgment should be entered. The basis of these insistences is that these holdings were not made pursuant to any assignment of error. We respectfully disagree.
In the first two assignments petitioner asserts that “there is no competent material evidence to support a finding that petitioner was liable for taxes.” This, along with insistences made in the respective briefs of counsel and oral argument made at the bar of the Court, required us to look to the evidence.
The basic issue in this controversy was whether the income from a spendthrift trust is subject to a lien for the payment of federal taxes. A secondary issue was the amount of the federal tax liability.
After we had determined that the Chancellor and the Court of Appeals correctly decided the primary issue, orderly consideration of the case required that we decide whether the government was entitled to judgment. In making this determination, we considered the admissibility of the Certificates of Assessments and the validity of the notices of tax liens. An orderly and efficient disposition of these matters was indispensable to a resolution of this controversy.
The petition to rehear is respectfully denied.
All concur.
. We actually held them to be admissible.

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Source: Frix Law Library, https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9684613. Public record. Not legal advice.