Thread: Touching

What is this case about?
Edie Windsor and Thea Spyer shared their lives together as a committed couple for 44 years. They became a couple in 1965, got engaged in 1967, and married in Canada in 2007, after it became legal. When Thea died in 2009, the federal government refused to recognize their marriage and taxed Edie’s inheritance from Thea as though they were strangers. Under federal tax law, a spouse who dies can leave her assets, including the family home, to the other spouse without incurring estate taxes. Because of a law called the Defense of Marriage Act, or DOMA, the federal government refuses to treat married same-sex couples, like Edie and Thea, the same way as other married couples. This case points out that it is a denial of the equal protection principles of the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution for the federal government to pick and choose which marriages it will recognize for federal purposes, when it otherwise leaves that question entirely up to the states.

from the faq I linked on the first page

Deductions and the taxable estate
Once the value of the "gross estate" is determined, the law provides for various "deductions" (in Part IV of Subchapter A of Chapter 11 of Subtitle B of the Internal Revenue Code) in arriving at the value of the "taxable estate." Deductions include but are not limited to:
Funeral expenses, administration expenses, and claims against the estate;[14]
Certain charitable contributions;[15]
Certain items of property left to the surviving spouse.[16]
Beginning in 2005, inheritance or estate taxes paid to states or the District of Columbia.[17]
Of these deductions, the most important is the deduction for property passing to (or in certain kinds of trust, for) the surviving spouse, because it can eliminate any federal estate tax for a married decedent. However, this unlimited deduction does not apply if the surviving spouse (not the decedent) is not a U.S. citizen.[18] A special trust called a Qualified Domestic Trust or QDOT must be used to obtain an unlimited marital deduction for otherwise disqualified spouses.[19]

Estate tax in the United States - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Congress has passed tax laws that have made numerous, temporary changes to both the estate tax rate and the exemption amount. Since 2002, the top rate has decreased incrementally from 50%, and the exemption amount has increased incrementally from $1 million. In 2009 the rate was 45% and the exemption amount was $3.5 million. On January 1, 2010 a "one year repeal" of the tax was effectuated by a temporary, one-year-only rate of 0%. On January 1, 2011 the estate tax is scheduled to a top rate of 35% and the exemption amount is scheduled to be $5.0 million, or $10 million for married couples. (law passed in December 2010)