trust
Definitions from Case Law · United States Supreme Court
Definitions from Case Law
From 289 U.S. 20 - Anderson v. Wilson · 1933Most cited · 344 citing opinions
income tax
the law has seen fit to deal with this abstraction for income tax purposes as a separate existence, making its own return under the hand of the fiduciary and claiming and receiving its own appropriate deductions.
How the Supreme Court has restated “trust”
Each Supreme Court definition of “trust,” sized by how often later courts cited it. “Change” is measured by wording overlap with earlier definitions — a rough signal, not a semantic judgment.
How often courts cite the cases defining “trust”
Court decisions citing the 3 opinions that defined “trust” — 468 in all, by decade. Counts are citations to the defining cases as a whole, not verified uses of the term. The dip in the most recent years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the latest years.
All 3 definitions, chronological · 1812–1933
- ORIGINAL
There must be in every trust, a subject of the trust, a trustee, and a cestue que trust.
elements
A trust is where there are rights, titles, and interests in property distinct from the legal ownership. In such cases, the legal title, in the eye of the law, carries with it, to the holder, absolute dominion; but behind it lie beneficial rights and interests in the same property belonging to another. These rights, to the extent to which they exist, are a charge upon the property, and constitute an equity which a court of equity will protect and enforce whenever its aid for that purpose is properly invoked.