Family Trusts. Keith Whitaker

only what's permitted within the four corners of the document.” The document is no doubt of great importance. But it is of importance because it has an impact on the lives of people.

      Fidelity is not an easy path. Often, the more comfortable route is to become the agent of the trust creator or a beneficiary. Fidelity means recognizing and resisting these temptations. One way that I think of fidelity is that my role, as trustee, is not just to speak for the trust creator or just to listen to the beneficiary (though both of those activities are very important) but, above all, to keep alive the spirit of the gift. I owe my fidelity to the gift and the relationships it creates rather than only to the giver or only to the recipient.

      What I mean by “the spirit of the gift” is a topic that goes beyond the confines of this introduction. My co-authors and I discuss it much more fully in our Cycle of the Gift: Family Wealth and Wisdom (New York: Bloomberg, 2013). Put simply, every true gift contains much more than the material “stuff” that is transferred. It contains spirit. Sometimes that spirit expresses expectations around work or education; sometimes it has to do with a vision of entrepreneurship; sometimes it concerns family life and relationships. The spirit of the gift may be expressed, in words or in writings, or it may be unspoken but felt. In any case, it holds great power for the giver and the recipient. As the Roman philosopher Seneca wrote 2,000 years ago, “As a gift is given, so shall it be received.” If there is no spirit in a gift, then we call it a “transfer,” and in such cases it is not surprising if the recipient finds the gift to be a lifeless or even life-draining force. Most of the gifts that lead to the “horror stories” told about “trust fund babies” are not gifts with spirit; they are transfers.

      A trustee's fidelity expresses itself in its highest form in identifying, fostering, and keeping alive the spirit of the gift. There are various ways of doing so. It may mean helping the trust creator write down or record his or her wishes for the trust. It may mean trying to piece together those wishes, values, or philosophy after the grantor has passed away, in the form of a “preamble,” as we discuss in Chapter 10. It may mean finding ways regularly to remind the beneficiaries of those values through individual or family meetings. It may also mean listening to the beneficiaries and working with them to figure out how to integrate the spirit of the gift meaningfully into their own lives. It is all the more important to take these steps if a trustee finds him- or herself entrusted with spiritless trusts – that is, trusts that embody transfers, set up solely with a view toward tax savings.

      1

      Goldstone and Wiseman, TrustWorthy – New Angles on Trusts from Beneficiaries and Trustees. Trustscape LLC (2012).

      2

      See Hartley Goldstone, Scotty McLennan, and Keith Whitaker, “The Moral Core of Trusteeship: How to Develop Fiduciary Character.” Trusts & Estates (May 2013), 49–52.