In the case of Commissioner of Internal Revenue v. Fisher et al., Executor, 1945, the U.S Supreme Court was tasked with determining whether or not a widow's life estate in her deceased husband's property could be included in his gross estate for federal tax purposes. The court ruled that it could indeed be included as per Section 811(c) of the Internal Revenue Code. This section allows for inclusion if there is any interest passing to surviving spouse and decedent had an interest at time of death which he transferred without adequate consideration before death where transfer was intended to take effect after his death. In this case, Mr. Fisher had created a trust fund during his lifetime from which income went to him and then upon his demise would go to Mrs.Fisher until she died or remarried; thereafter principal would revert back to their children.The court held that since Mr.Fisher retained control over disposition by retaining power through trusteeship until end of wife’s life estate,this constituted sufficient retention under statute hence taxable.

In the dissenting opinion for Commissioner of Internal Revenue v. Fisher et al., Executor, Justice Jackson argued that the majority's interpretation of Section 302(c) was incorrect and overly broad. He believed that this section should only apply to cases where a corporation is being dissolved or significantly altered in structure, not simply when shareholders decide to sell their shares back to the company. Furthermore, he disagreed with the majority's view that any transaction involving corporate stock could be considered a partial liquidation under Section 302(c). Instead, he felt it should only apply if there was an actual reduction in capital assets as part of a larger plan by management. Lastly, Justice Jackson expressed concern about potential tax avoidance schemes resulting from this ruling and warned against allowing corporations too much leeway in determining their own tax liabilities.