Professor Thomas P. Gallanis recently published an essay in the ACTEC Law Journal, titled “The Dark Side of Codification.” The essay is part of an issue that examines the Uniform Trust Code on its twentieth anniversary.

From the essay:

The twentieth anniversary of the promulgation of the Uniform Trust Code (UTC) is an occasion for celebration and reflection. The time is right for celebration because the UTC is one of the successes of the Uniform Law Commission (ULC). Thirty-four states and the District of Columbia have enacted enough of the UTC to be counted by the ULC as enacting jurisdictions. By comparison, the Uniform Probate Code, parts of which have influenced virtually every state in the nation, has only eighteen enacting jurisdictions. The time also is right for reflection. Prior to the UTC, the law of trusts in the U.S. was primarily common law, albeit with specific uniform statutes such as the Uniform Principal and Income Act (originally promulgated in 1931), the Uniform Trustees’ Powers Act (1964), and the Uniform Prudent Investor Act (1994). Has the UTC’s comprehensive codification of trust law been a force for good or for ill? On balance, the UTC’s achievement is remarkable and generally a force for good. The harmonization, modernization, and codification of trust law in so many U.S. states facilitates multi-jurisdictional trust activity and provides each enacting jurisdiction with a comprehensive law of trusts, whereas previously only the questions of trust law litigated in the state would have produced answers in the state's case law. But the promulgation of the UTC has not been an unqualified good. This essay offers a reminder that the codification of trust law in the U.S. has a dark side.

The article is available in HeinOnline and Westlaw. The entire issue is available for purchase through the American College of Trust and Estate Counsel.

Professor Gallanis is the executive director of the Joint Editorial Board for Uniform Trust and Estate Acts, which is the official oversight body for all uniform laws in the field of trusts and succession.

Thomas P. Gallanis, The Dark Side of Codification, 45 ACTEC L.J. 31 (2019).

For more publications by Professor Gallanis, visit the Law Library’s faculty bibliography.