States converted to community property to win their wealthy residents tax breaks.

Evidence

An alternative approach was directed toward state legislatures. The goal was to get lawmakers to pass bills to convert their states from separate property to community property. In 1939, Oklahoma, concerned about the exodus of its wealthy oil barons to the neighboring community property state of Texas, tried to create a community property “opt-in” law. Only those couples who wished to have community property rules apply to them would be treated as if they were living in a community property state. The Supreme Court held in 1944 that this opt-in approach was not a true community property regime, hence no tax break for those spouses. The following year, the Oklahoma legislature adopted a true community property regime, which was upheld by the Supreme Court. Now the Oklahoma 5 percenters could get a tax break just like the Seaborns! — Dorothy A. Brown, The Whiteness of Wealth, 91