## Facts

- Helen Bostwick executed an inter vivos trust deed naming Farmers’ Loan & Trust Company as trustee for the benefit of her daughter and grandchildren, delivering $5,000 and reserving the right to add property later.
- Helen held an equitable interest in property to be distributed to her after judicial settlement of a separate trustee’s accounting for her late husband’s large trust.
- On the same day as the trust deed, Helen executed powers of attorney authorizing Farmers to receive, collect, and transfer to itself as trustee the money and securities she would receive from the accounting, and she sent a letter directing that the distributions be transferred into the trust.
- After the accounting was settled, the distributing trustee delivered an initial block of securities to Farmers during Helen’s lifetime; additional securities were not yet ready for delivery.
- Helen died the same night as the partial delivery. Her will (naming Farmers as executor) disposed of a large estate.
- Months after her death, the distributing trustee delivered the remaining securities to Farmers, prompting a dispute whether Farmers held them as trust property or as estate property.

## Issues

1. Whether the trust deed, powers of attorney, and contemporaneous letter constituted a present, effective assignment or declaration of trust of Helen’s equitable interest in the forthcoming distributions.
2. Whether the post-death delivery of securities to Farmers belonged to the inter vivos trust or instead passed under the will due to lack of delivery or will formalities.

## Decision

- The New York Court of Appeals reversed the lower courts and held the disputed securities belonged to the inter vivos trust.
- The court treated the trust deed, powers of attorney, and letter as a single integrated transaction showing a present, irrevocable disposition of Helen’s equitable interest.
- The court rejected the view that Helen’s failure to personally receive and redeliver the remaining securities before death made the transfer incomplete.
- Because Farmers was appointed as Helen’s agent to receive the distributions and instructed to hold them as trustee, delivery to Farmers (even after death) effectuated the prior assignment and trust direction.
- The arrangement was upheld as operative inter vivos, not an invalid testamentary disposition.

## Legal Principles

- A present assignment or declaration of trust may validly transfer an existing equitable interest even though the specific property will be identified or delivered later.
- Related instruments executed as part of the same transaction are construed together to determine whether there was a present, irrevocable disposition rather than an unenforceable future promise.
- When a settlor authorizes the trustee as attorney-in-fact to receive property and directs it to be held under an existing trust, additional physical delivery by the settlor is not required once the property comes into the trustee’s hands.
- An inter vivos disposition is not rendered testamentary merely because administrative steps (including delivery from a third party) occur after the settlor’s death, if the transfer was effective during life.

## Conclusion

The court held that Helen’s integrated trust instruments effected a present transfer of her equitable interest in the anticipated distributions, so securities delivered to the trustee after her death were trust property and did not pass under her will.


Farmers’ Loan & Trust Co. v. Winthrop, 238 N.Y. 477, 144 N.E. 686 (N.Y. 1924)