Tax Law

Designed to give students a familiarity with accounting and business theory and terminology. Heavy emphasis is placed on planning and analyzing various business transactions from an accounting and legal perspective using financial data and incorporating tax implications. Please check the most recent course registration information to determine if this course meets the Experiential Education/Professional Skills requirement.

Examines the similarities and differences among various types of business organizations (sole proprietorships, partnerships, corporations, and limited liability companies). Important issues studied include organization and formation requirements; roles, responsibilities, and potential liabilities of persons acting on behalf of the business organization and/or owning the business organization; the procedures and most frequent grounds for litigation involving business organizations; corporate social responsibility; and a brief introduction to the law of securities regulation and corporate control.

This capstone course focuses on typical issues lawyers face in representing closely-held and private businesses.  These issues track the life cycle of the business from formation through operation and growth and ending with an exit from the business.  The approach of the course integrates issues from substantive corporation law, partnership law and limited liability company (LLC) law with federal business income tax and federal securities law issues.  Specific issues addressed include: choice of entity; determining governance structure; financing the business; compensating the owners and manager; operating and growing the business; exit strategies including selling the business, merging the business, or going public.  Additional topics include practical and ethical issues involving who the lawyer represents, distinguishing legal issues from business issues and alternatives to traditional hourly billing. This course may be offered every other year.

Covers both estate planning for smaller estates and tax-oriented estate planning. After a consideration of planning techniques for the smaller estate, basic concepts of federal estate and gift taxation are introduced through the study of relevant estate and gift tax code sections and regulations. Thereafter, the course considers various problems involved in planning for the preservation and disposition of wealth. Among the tools studied are wills, revocable and irrevocable inter vivos trusts, and various gifting techniques. Careful analysis is given to the impact of estate, gift, and income tax laws on the disposition of property under different types of plans. Please check the most recent course registration information to determine if this course meets the Experiential Education/Professional Skills requirements.

Surveys many legal problems of the family. Students taking this course will learn about the effect of the constitution on reproductive activity and family formation and structure. They also will learn about procedures for family dissolution, custody, and support, regardless of whether there has been a marriage or not. In addition, students will learn about the various ways in which members of families can use contracts to create their own relations and the settings in which the state does not permit self-determination. Finally, the course explores the lawyer’s role in family counseling and litigation. One or more written exercises are sometimes required during the course, in addition to a final examination.

Focuses on three principal areas: real estate sales, conveyancing, and mortgage law. In the area of sales transactions, the course covers such topics as the lawyer’s professional responsibility, duties owed by brokers to sellers and buyers, offers of purchase, purchase and sales agreements, remedies for breach, and closing. In the area of conveyancing, the course covers the requisites and construction of deeds, escrows, surveyor malpractice, recording procedures, liabilities of grantors for defective conditions, title searches, title abstracts, and title insurance. In the mortgage law component, the course covers the defining characteristics and standard provisions of a mortgage, mortgage substitutes, discrimination in lending, lien priorities and subordination of interests, assignments by mortgagees, transfer by mortgagors, foreclosures, redemption, waste, usury, and fixture security interests. The course emphasizes the negotiation and proper drafting of instruments.

This course will examine nonprofit organizations and the sector in which they operate. The course will focus on the legal framework governing the operation of the nonprofit organizations, including issues of choice of form, governing bodies, and regulation of solicitations. The course also will survey the basic federal income and state property tax issues relevant to operation of the nonprofit organization. These issues include qualification for tax exemption, filing requirements, engaging in commercial activities, and the distinction between public charities and private foundations. This course may be offered every other year.

This course covers the Internal Revenue Code provisions applicable to the tax treatment of individual taxpayers. Students also will study tax policy, case law, and the tax doctrines and principles applicable to the determination of an individual’s taxable income. This course provides the basic structure for understanding and interpreting the Internal Revenue Code, and serves as a foundation for upper-level tax and business-related law school courses. Areas of coverage includes: gross income; the tax consequences of property transactions; property acquired by gift, bequest, devise, or inheritance; scholarships, prizes, and awards; life insurance and annuities; discharge of indebtedness; personal injury damages; fringe benefits; divorce; and deductions related to a trade or business or profit-seeking activity. When offered as a distance-learning course, there will be required weekly readings from the casebook and online statutory and regulatory sources, regular mini-lectures on prerecorded video accompanied by PowerPoint slides, discussion forums to which students must make posts each week, and weekly quizzes. All course material other than the casebook will be accessible by any computing device through an Internet connection. While most of the course will be asynchronous, opportunities will be presented for synchronous digital chat. In addition to posing questions and providing guidance on the discussion boards and through the video lectures, the professor will be available throughout the course by e-mail, conference call, or live chat. Grading will be based on participation in the forums (including a qualitative component), performance on quizzes, and a final “open-book” examination.

This course covers the federal tax treatment of the four main business entity forms. Students will study and learn the tax provisions and tax principles that provide for double tax treatment of C corporations and single-level tax treatment of S corporations, partnerships, and limited liability companies. Emphasis will be on issues related to the formation, operation, and liquidation of those business entities. This course is intended for students with an interest in a business law practice, for students who have a strong interest in tax law, as well as for students who are interested in specializing in tax law.

This course is designed to give the student a grounding in the general law relating to donative transfers of property interests taking place at death. It covers intestate succession, wills laws, nonprobate transfers, and some trust laws. It is not jurisdiction-specific; instead, it focuses on majority and minority rules and trends in the law. Jurisdictional comparisons often will be made. When offered as a distance learning course, there will be required weekly readings from the casebook, regular mini-lectures on prerecorded video accompanied by PowerPoint slides, discussion forums to which students must make posts each week, and weekly assessments, including quizzes. All course material other than the casebook will be accessible by any computing device through an Internet connection. While most of the course will be asynchronous, opportunities will be presented for synchronous digital chat. In addition to posing questions and providing guidance on the discussion boards and through the video lectures, the professor will be available throughout the course by e-mail, telephone, in-person at New England Law Boston, and/or via Skype. Grading will be based on participation in the forums (including a qualitative component), performance on quizzes, and a final “open-book” examination.