Ethical Problems in Federal Tax Practice
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Description
The “old authors,” Bernard Wolfman and James Holden, believe that the most important innovation that this edition offers is the work of Deborah Schenk, who has joined with them as a co-author and has pulled the laboring oar. Ten years have elapsed since publication of the second edition. A good deal has happened since then. In 1985 only a few states had accepted the ABA’s Model Rules of Professional Conduct as the basis (with or without modification) for regulating lawyer conduct within their borders. Today, 40 states have done so. In 1985 tax shelters were at the peak of their heyday, and tax lawyers sometimes played an unseemly and inappropriate role in their creation and marketing. The ABA and the Treasury Department were giving a considerable amount of thought and time to the problem. Just after the second edition of this book was published, the ABA issued Formal Opinion 85-352, which went beyond Formal Opinion 346 issued in 1982, and modified the standard for taking a position on a return that Formal Opinion 314 had established in 1965. The Treasury Department followed the ABA, modifying Circular 230 to adopt the standard set forth in Opinion 85-352. This edition covers those developments and the problems for the profession that have unfolded in their wake. Although the basic structured of this edition follows the two earlier editions, much of the material is new, and within chapters there has been considerable reorganization. The book analyzes the statutory changes that Congress has enacted with respect to both return preparers and taxpayers. Materials on malpractice liability have been expanded, since the prevalence of malpractice actions against tax practitioners has increased. Throughout the book we have maintained the underlying theme of role differentiation that brings to the fore the somewhat differing standards that govern the tax lawyer as advocate from those that govern the tax lawyer as adviser. We encourage you—professors and students alike—to read the prefaces to the earlier editions. Along with this preface, the predecessors will give you the authors’ conceptions and, basically, what they have and have not done and why. Knowing what the authors were up to should facilitate both teaching and learning.
Publication Date
1995
Edition
3
Recommended Citation
Wolfman, Bernard; Holden, James P.; and Schenk, Deborah H., "Ethical Problems in Federal Tax Practice" (1995). Faculty Books & Edited Works. 620.
https://gretchen.law.nyu.edu/fac-books-edited-works/620
