Harvard Prof. Robert Sitkoff to Speak on Incapacity Planning at University of Illinois

Harvard Law Professor Robert H. Sitkoff is speaking at University of Illinois School of Law on Monday, March 9.  The topic is “Revocable Trusts & Incapacity Planning: More then Just a Will Substitute.”  

Here are details provided by Illinois Law Professor Richard Kaplan: 

The use of trusts has evolved from means of transferring property to mechanisms for managing assets and more recently, to will substitutes for avoiding probate and simplifying post-death transfers. But lawyers increasingly use revocable trusts in planning for possible client incapacity to avoid the costs and publicity associated with custodianship and guardianship. State-level reforms of trust law to accommodate older uses of these devices are not, however, well-suited to this newer use of trusts, and this lecture will examine those reforms in this context.

Professor Sitkoff was the youngest professor to receive a chair in the history of Harvard Law School. He previously taught at New York University School of Law and at Northwestern University School of Law. After graduated from the University of Chicago Law School with High Honors, he clerked for then Chief Judge Richard A. Posner of the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit. Professor Sitkoff is an active participant in trust and estates law reform. He is a liaison member of the Joint Editorial Board for Uniform Trusts and Estates Acts within the Uniform Law Commission and has been a member of several drafting committees for acts involving trusts and estates matters. Sitkoff is also a member of the American Law Institute’s Council and has served on the consultative groups for the Restatement (Third) of Trusts and the Restatement (Third) of Property: Wills and Other Donative Transfers.

Word from Dick Kaplan is that Rob’s  presentation will be available (eventually) via a recording, and his presentation will also be captured as an article in University of Illinois’ Elder Law Journal. 

My students often ask why all casebooks can’t be as engaging to read as the “Dukeminier” text on Wills, Trusts & Estates — and I suspect one reason is that Rob Sitkoff, although uniquely prolific and gifted, is still only human and cannot write them all! 

Postscript:  I asked Rob to send me something other than his “official” Harvard photo.  The one above seems to capture his spirit and the smile I sometimes detect in his footnotes.