## Facts

- Jessie Marjorie Cook’s will created three related testamentary trusts to fund women’s-rights objectives.
- The will directed (1) $10,000 to help secure enactment of a federal Equal Rights Amendment, (2) $25,000 to aid women in Maryland harmed by legal inequality and to promote women’s social and economic equality, and (3) the residuary estate for the furtherance of equality for women, including work associated with the Maryland Branch of the National Woman’s Party.
- Individual and corporate trustees were appointed to administer the trusts.
- A family member contested the bequests; the dispute was resolved by settlement, under which approximately $380,000 ultimately passed to the women’s-rights trusts.
- The Register of Wills sought to impose Maryland inheritance/estate tax on the $380,000, asserting the trusts involved lobbying or political activity and therefore were not charitable for tax-exemption purposes.
- The estate representatives and trustee maintained the trusts served charitable purposes and the transfers were tax-exempt.

## Issues

1. Whether testamentary trusts principally aimed at eliminating discrimination against women and promoting women’s equality, including by pursuing legal change such as an Equal Rights Amendment, qualify as charitable trusts under Maryland law.
2. Whether bequests funding such trusts are exempt from Maryland inheritance/estate tax under a statute exempting transfers for charitable purposes.
3. Whether contemplated legislative advocacy or law-reform activity disqualifies an otherwise charitable trust from charitable classification and tax exemption.

## Decision

- The Maryland Court of Appeals affirmed the determination that the trusts were charitable and the bequests were tax-exempt.
- The court held the dominant purpose of the trusts was a public benefit: reducing discrimination against women and advancing equality.
- The court ruled that the inclusion of efforts to change existing law, including advocacy for an Equal Rights Amendment, did not negate charitable status when the overall purpose remained charitable.
- Accordingly, the amounts passing to the trusts were exempt from Maryland inheritance/estate tax.

## Legal Principles

- A trust is charitable when its primary and dominant objective serves a public benefit, even if it contemplates incidental or related efforts to bring about changes in existing law.
- Legislative advocacy or law-reform activity does not automatically render a trust noncharitable; the controlling inquiry is whether the trust is essentially and primarily charitable in purpose.
- For Maryland inheritance/estate tax purposes, transfers to testamentary trusts classified as charitable fall within statutory exemptions for charitable bequests.

## Conclusion

Maryland recognized women’s-rights and equality-focused testamentary trusts as charitable despite planned advocacy for legal change, and it upheld tax exemption for the estate’s bequests because the trusts’ dominant purpose was a public charitable benefit.


Register of Wills for Balt. City v. Cook, 241 Md. 264, 216 A.2d 542 (1966)