Should "estate planning" include self-defense preparation?Armed citizens might consider that having a well-ordered estate plan may reduce hesitation and improve combat mindset. But is the converse true--might self-defense preparation enhance an estate plan?
Estate planning attorneys help provide documents, legal counsel, and training to protect families at key life events related to succession and incapacity. Self-defense preparation (e.g.,
firearms training) is at least relevant to, and depending on circumstances should perhaps be an integral part of, estate planning for many clients. For these clients, there is a need for legal counsel on this subject.
Estate planning attorneys routinely venture beyond the estate (property) realm: e.g., health care directives often press the envelope on plug-pulling; incentive trust provisions can reach like a hand from the grave to guide (reward, punish) descendants, transmitting important values.
Yet self-defense preparation is also relevant to
property (the main focus of planning, typically). Americans often speak of their sidearms as "life insurance," and no one doubts the relevance of life insurance to estate planning--key man life insurance is routinely used to fund business buyout agreements and/or ensure continuity of the family business, but self-defense preparation might actually avoid death or disability of the key man (plus it transmits important values and may defer estate tax). [Yes, it's possible to go too far with this--eating right is another way to defer estate tax, etc.--but you don't need a license to eat right and eating without legal counsel probably won't land you in jail.]
Given recent historic court decisions on the Second Amendment, why not offer clients the option of obtaining legal qualification, training, and counsel regarding self-defense?
