Estate Tax. The tax-cut reconciliation bill enacted in 2001 phases out the estate tax, finally abolishing it in 2010. Unfortunately, this and the other tax-cut provisions in the bill are sunset after 2010, meaning that the tax cuts will be reversed in 2011 unless Congress acts to make the cuts permanent. During consideration of the farm bill (S. 1731), Senator Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) offered an amendment to express the sense of the Senate that the estate tax’s repeal be made permanent. The farm bill is an appropriate vehicle for this "sense of the Senate" amendment since the estate tax, aka the death tax, has been responsible for liquidating family farms and other small privately owned businesses asset "rich" but cash poor.
The Senate adopted Kyl’s amendment on February 13, 2002 by a vote of 56 to 42 (Roll Call 28). We have assigned pluses to the yeas.
