A newsletter from the William Mitchell Institutional Advancement Office
A Family Legacy Will Help William Mitchell Students by Marie Ruzek ’01, Development Officer
As he approached retirement, Chapman, like many people, began to contemplate his legacy. He looked back on a satisfying career practicing law and forward to a quiet life with his wife. Jack ‘62 and Mary Chapman
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hile John “Jack” Chapman ’62 attended William Mitchell College of Law at night he worked as a court clerk in the Hennepin County Clerk of District Courts Office during the day at an “unbelievable apprenticeship,” where he saw nearly 250 trials. “That job motivated me to be a trial attorney,”Chapman recalled. He even had time on the job to get some of his law school reading done. It was an ideal situation. After graduating from William Mitchell, Chapman went on to a successful trial practice that spanned more than 40 years. He practiced law at the predecessor firm to
Robins Kaplan Miller & Ciresi, among others, before founding the Minneapolis firm of Arthur, Chapman, Kettering, Smetak & Pikala. As he approached retirement, Chapman, like many people, began to contemplate his legacy. He looked back on a satisfying career practicing law and forward to a quiet life with his wife, Mary, in Minnesota’s north woods lake country. “Trial practice is great–I loved every minute of it,” Chapman said. But he wondered how he would be remembered, and, more important, how would the Chapman family be remembered?
Chapman’s two older brothers and father also graduated from William Mitchell. Jack’s father, Donald Sr., was in the class of 1926, while his brother Donald Jr. was a 1950 graduate and brother Jerome followed not far behind in 1952. Because of the opportunity to attend law school at William Mitchell in the evening and work during the day, each of them was able to pursue a fulfilling legal career. Continued on Page 3
Winter 2009
Building a Legacy
William Mitchell College of Law
You can make a difference for William Mitchell
O
ur team of development professionals can help you and your estate planning advisors develop a plan to satisfy both your family and philanthropic goals. Contact: Lisa Barton ’97, 651-290-6357 lisa.barton@wmitchell.edu, or Marie Ruzek ’01, 651-290-6412 marie.ruzek@wmitchell.edu. And if you have not yet included the law school in your plans, there are several ways to become a Mitchell donor: • Cash and pledges • Stock and other securities • Real estate • IRA and retirement assets • Income-producing gifts • Charitable lead trusts • Life insurance • Estate gifts To ensure that we honor your wishes, please call Institutional Advancement at 651-290-6375 if your plans change. A Gift in Your Will An Easy Way to Turn Your Good Intentions into Action Sample Bequest Language I give William Mitchell College of Law, 875 Summit Avenue, St. Paul, MN 55105, (____% of the residue of my estate) or (the sum of $______), to be used wherever the needs and opportunities are greatest. 2
Your IRA is Worth More as a Charitable Gift
Leave an individual retirement account (IRA) to your children or
siblings and you may be leaving them almost nothing. This is a realization that many William Mitchell alumni and supporters are taking to heart. When they are considering their legacy, a planned gift through their IRA becomes an attractive option. IRAs are excellent vehicles for accumulating assets for your use during retirement, but they are terrible for transferring wealth to others. Those who inherit IRAs may find them seriously depleted by taxes—unless the recipient is a charitable entity like William Mitchell College of Law. Tax rules: Like other investments and savings, IRA assets may be subject to federal estate tax. What most people don’t realize is that IRA distributions carry an income tax liability, too, which carries over to your designated beneficiaries. This double bite of income and estate taxes often leaves little for your heirs. Only a surviving spouse can “roll over” an inherited IRA distribution to his or her own IRA, called a Spousal Rollover IRA, and further delay receiving distributions until his or her own date for required distributions, typically age 70½. Other recipients are not eligible to “roll over” their proceeds, although some may choose to “stretch out” their distributions over time with payments beginning immediately to help relieve the burden of paying income taxes on the distributions. Preserve your assets: IRA transfers to charitable organizations after your lifetime, however, avoid estate and income taxes. Estate planners often advise clients to consider a charitable bequest of IRA funds simply because an IRA is worth far more to a tax-exempt organization than it is to heirs, net of tax. You can give your surplus IRA funds to William Mitchell, preserving 100 percent of the value to support our mission of providing students access to a legal education grounded in practical wisdom rather than giving up a huge portion to taxes. Your IRA plan administrator or tax advisor can assist you in arranging to name us as the primary or secondary beneficiary of your IRAs. Your next step: If you would like to learn more about this or other gift options, please contact Marie Ruzek ’01 to request a free brochure on “How to Make Charitable Gifts from your IRA.” Marie can be reached at 651-290-6412 or marie.ruzek@wmitchell.edu. © The Stelter Company The information in this publication is not intended as legal advice. For legal advice, please consult an attorney. Figures cited in examples are for hypothetical purposes only and are subject to change. References to estate and income tax include federal taxes only. Individual state taxes and/ or state law may impact your results.
William Mitchell College of Law
Feature continued from Page 1
Donald Chapman Sr. was a successful trial attorney in Minneapolis. Donald Chapman Jr. worked with renowned trial lawyer Eugene Rerat ’25, spent time at the Hennepin County Attorney’s office, and finished his career as a juvenile referee. Jerome Chapman practiced under Miles Lord in the Minnesota Attorney General’s Office and later worked in the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office until his retirement. Considering his family’s connection to William Mitchell and the opportunity the night program gave him to pursue his law degree, Jack Chapman decided to establish the Chapman Family Endowed Scholarship. Because he and his wife were in the early stages of retirement, they decided that the best way to make this gift would be through their will. The Chapmans’ legacy will help the next generation of promising law students fulfill their dreams of becoming lawyers. Chapman also wants to help William Mitchell students working toward a career in law because he has found much satisfaction in helping those coming up through the ranks. One of the most rewarding parts of his job at Arthur Chapman was running the firm’s associate training program.
IRA Rollover Provision Reinstated Through 2009 (Oct. 3, 2008) President Bush signed into law the $700 billion economic bailout bill (H.R. 1424, Financial Rescue Package), which includes a two-year extension of the IRA Rollover provision among other charitable giving provisions. The provision will be made retroactive to Jan. 1, 2008, and will apply to gifts made from that date through Dec. 31, 2009. It exempts from taxable income any funds transferred (“rolled over”) from an Individual Retirement Account (IRA) to
a charitable organization like William Mitchell. The following limitations apply:
Trial work is “a lot of work, but it’s a lot of fun too,” Chapman said. He wants students and young associates to learn to love trial practice as he did. With a planned gift to start the Chapman Family Scholarship and William Mitchell’s well-known trial skills training, the Chapman legacy will surely succeed in helping many bright law students grow to love the law.
Marie Ruzek ’01 is a development officer focusing on estate and planned giving in William Mitchell’s Office of Institutional Advancement.
• The donor must be age 70½ or older. • The cap on annual IRA rollovers is $100,000 per person. • The contribution must be a direct gift to a charity (no estate gifts).
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