The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1911-10-05
TAX COMMISSIONER
 IS ENTHUSIASTIC
His Advice to the Attorney General and an Interpretation of Law
 Which is Disputed.
DEFENSE OF PROBATE
 DECISIONS OF THE STATE.

DECISIONS OF THE STATE. To the Editor of the Hartford Times: It was not necessary and certainly it was not the official duty of Tax Commissioner Corbin, in a letter ask
 ing the attorney general for his legal opinion, to intimate that probate judges were in collision with the heirs in granting an allowance for the sup
 port of the family during the settle ment of the estate, and to accuse the heirs of asking and securing an al- lowance for no other purpose than to practically increase the exemption allowed by the statutes in computing the succession tax.
 His statement that allowances have frequently been improperly secured from probate courts is a serious re- flection upon the intelligence or the integrity of the probate judges who granted them.
 His Real Reason
 | In his zeal to increase the revenues of the state the tax commissioner has interested himself in the adminiStra- ton of the probate office and has started his official inquiry into the legality of the practice of the probate courts in computing the successor tax. and while he intimates that it IS IoT tliC pChcIlS VI lIC PiOOoSC JUNoSS that he asks the attorney general, Should the allowance be deducted in ascertaining the taxable estate," his real object in asking the question was to induce the probate judges to change | their practice so as to increase the states revenue. It is singular that the probate judges, if they really desired the advice of the attorney-general, allowed the tax commissioner to ask the question, receive the reply, have | 1t printed and then send it to them instead of asking for his advice them selves.
 l. A Right to Know
 The attorney general is of the opin- | ion that it ought. not to be deducted, | yet he gives no reason for his opinion, except to say that the allowance IS not an expense of administration. Pro- bate judges, if they are expected to | take his legal opinion as law, have a right to know his reasons why the allowance is not an expense of ad- ministration, and should not be asked | to accept his mere dictum without any reasons given, especially when his opinion is contrary to the statutes, to | the uniform practice of the probate courts and the decisions of the su- preme court
 1 It is admitted that unless the al- | lowance is an expense of adminis- l tration it ought not to be deducted ''in ascertaining the taxable estate" This then is the question at issue, "is l the allowance an exepnse of admins | tration?"
 There are many reasons why the allownace is an expense of adminis- | tration. First and most important the statutes say it is an expense of ad- | ministration and gives to the probate
 court 'the power of taking the prop i erty of the heir. and devises and ap- propriating it for the benefit of others l without the consent of the owner" because it is necessary for the support | of the family during the settlement of | the estate, and it directs the court to take it out of the estate as an expense of administration even before the rest ] of the estate can be distributed. Practice for Early Time
 Further, the probate judges, in com pliance.s with Sthee~ statutes, have al- ways deducted the allowance as a part | of the expenses of administration and | 'it was the practice from very early time in our history, if not from l the settlement of the colony of Con- 1 nectictut, for the court administering | the estate of a deceased person to make such allowance out of the es- | tate, and this practice became part | of our common law"
 | And finally, the supreme court has decided in the case of Ravens ap- peal from probate that the allowance was an expense of administration and that during the settlement of the estate the personal property is in the hands of the law charged with the fulfillment of certain legal duties be- | longing to the former owner at the time of his death, among these are the payment of his debts and the sup <1f hi fc >,jl oy y1d n a extent the use of the estate for the purpose cf that support even para mount to the payment of debts" The payment of the allowance Is in legal effect the payment of preferred debt which the deceased owed to his family at the time of his death for their SUD- port after his death, and the law takes his property to discharge it to the prejudice of the heirs, and as it is a debt it must therefore be deduct ed with the other debts, ''in ascer- taining the taxtable estate"
 Deducts It Last
 The encouragement distinguishes between the payment of debt and the payment of the allowance fin as- certaining the taxable estate,'' al- though they are both legal obligations
 existing at the time of his death and payable out of the estate of the de- ceased. The law makes no distinc-
 tion except in their payment, and while the law deducts it last, or rath- CT not at all.
 The property of the heir cannot law | fully be taken to pay the allowance unless it is an expense of adminis- tration. If it is not such an expense the probate judges who have granted allowances and deducted them from l the estate during all the years from | a very .early time in our history until 1 it has become a part of our common | law have acted without legal author