The below message is reproduced from an announcement appearing in the AALS Trusts & Estates distribution list:
The law of succession has long been the province of the states, producing a patchwork of rules governing wills, intestacy, trusts, and the transfer of wealth at death. Yet in recent decades, uniform acts, model codes, shared doctrinal pressures, and economic competition have pushed many jurisdictions toward common approaches, even as others have charted distinctly divergent paths.
This panel invites papers exploring the forces driving convergence and divergence in succession law across the states. Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:
• Divergent state approaches to trusts, ranging from domestic asset protection trusts to trust decanting;
• Differing state approaches to families, including spousal protection at death through intestacy, the elective share, pretermitted spousal rights, rights in blended families, and embryo status;
• The role of state courts in harmonizing or fragmenting doctrine
• Interstate variation in intestacy rules and formalities for will execution, including e-wills;
• Choice-of-law and multistate estate planning challenges arising from doctrinal divergence;
• Comparative or empirical analyses of state reform trends;
• Differing possibilities of wealth taxation including the Rule Against Perpetuities and the billionaire tax;
• Theoretical accounts of why succession law resists or embraces uniformity; and
• Comparative approaches to planning for incapacity.
We welcome submissions from scholars at all career stages, including junior faculty and those new to the field. Papers may be doctrinal, empirical, comparative, or theoretical in approach.
Submission Instructions: Please submit an abstract of no more than 500 words to Eric Chaffee, exc178@case.edu, by Sept. 1, 2026. Selected presenters will be notified by Sept. 15 and invited to present at the AALS Annual Meeting in New York, which is scheduled for Tuesday, January 5 – Friday, January 8, 2027.
Questions: Please contact Eric Chaffee, Chair-Elect.