ANDREA MONROE, Temple University - James E. Beasley School of Law
Email: andrea.monroe@temple.edu

The partnership taxation rules of subchapter K are uniquely flawed, afflicted by a combination of flexibility, technically complex provisions, and low enforcement resources. As a result, partnerships remain the preferred vehicle for tax shelter activity, with extraordinary costs for the public at large.

Despite ample scholarship concerning tax shelters, little attention has been paid to the interaction between subchapter K and tax shelters. This article supplements the literature by proposing a solution targeted to subchapter K’s peculiar and deepening crisis. More specifically, I suggest that the Treasury revise one of subchapter K’s most infamous and least successful provisions - the partnership anti-abuse rule.

The Treasury promulgated this anti-abuse rule in 1994 amidst unprecedented controversy, and to this day, the regulation generates visceral reactions from scholars and practitioners alike. After tracing the remarkable history of the partnership anti-abuse rule, including its stunning failure, this article recommends that the Treasury revise the rule, returning it to its origins and correcting mistakes made in the six-month interval between the rule’s proposal and its issuance in final form. Doing so would free the partnership anti-abuse rule to more effectively challenge partnership tax shelters. Likewise, a revised partnership anti-abuse rule would provide urgently needed structural support for subchapter K as a whole. Indeed, a revised partnership anti-abuse rule could bring stability to this troubled and often overlooked corner of the federal income tax system.

LEE HARRIS, University of Memphis - Cecil C. Humphreys School of Law
Email: laharris@memphis.edu

Since the earliest days, the vast majority of law schools have used a case-dialogue approach that does a good job of teaching students legal doctrine and analysis, but fails to pay much direct attention to helping students develop professional skills that would serve future clients and the public. In fact, the problem with legal education has very recently been made crystal clear in the recent Carnegie report on legal education, Educating Lawyers: Preparation for the Profession of Law: The education of law students is too rarely focused on skills useful to a practicing attorney. This is a significant (and continuing) shortcoming in legal education, particularly since the vast majority of law students will at some point practice law.

This book steps into that gap in legal education. It offers students carefully edited cases; intriguing notes and questions; and, significantly, exercises drawn from actual cases to create a practical and skills-driven approach to the study of the legal doctrine of business. It will serve as a template for other casebooks and answer the call of legal educators who want to update the case-dialogue approach to the 21st century.