Sandra Day O'Connor

“ Furthermore, a taxpayer may generally claim an immediate deduction for a gift to a trustee, even though receipt of the gift by the charity is delayed. Recognizing this characteristic of gifts in trust, Congress further amended § 170 in 1964 in order to encourage donations "to" a charity, because donations "in trust for" a charity "often do not find their way into operating philanthropic endeavors for extended periods of time." ”

“ Accordingly, we conclude that a gift or contribution is "for the use of" a qualified organization when it is held in a legally enforceable trust for the qualified organization or in a similar legal arrangement.
Viewing the record here in the light most favorable to petitioners, as we must after a grant of summary judgment for the United States, we discern no evidence that petitioners transferred funds to their sons "in trust for" the Church. It is undisputed that petitioners transferred the money to their sons' personal bank accounts on which the sons were the sole authorized signatories. ”

“ We conclude that § 1.170A-1 (g) does not allow taxpayers to claim a deduction for expenses not incurred in connection with the taxpayers' own rendition of services to a qualified organization. Therefore, petitioners are not entitled to a deduction under § 1.170A-1 (g) .
Petitioners also assert that because their sons are agents of the Church authorized to receive payments to support their own missionary efforts, payments made to their sons are payments to the Church. Because this argument was neither raised before nor decided by the Court of Appeals, we decline to address it here. ”