SECTION III. When Charitable Institutions are or are not exempt from Poor and Church Rates. THE nominal trustees or governors of an hospital are not rateable to the hospital itself, although poor rates had been paid in respect of part of the site before it was appropriated to the purpose of an hospital; the servants and objects of the charity, who have no control over the premises which they inhabit, are also exempt (o). In order to constitute such an occupation of property as to make it rateable to the poor, it is necessary not only that the person should have possession, but that he should such a control and dominion over the subject, as implies freedom from any paramount occupation, such as a farmer enjoys over his farm, and the master of a family over his house. A person who dedicates his property to charitable purposes, without making any profit of it, is not liable to be rated; as where the owner of a house, which had previously been rated, pulled it down and built another house, in which ten poor girls were educated, maintained, and brought up at the donor's expense, and such poor girls, and a woman, provided by the donor, to superintend and instruct them, were the only inhabitants, and all vacancies were from time to time supplied at the donor's discretion (p). A person employed by the Philanthropic Society to superintend the children at annual wages, under an agreement that she should have a dwelling-house free from taxes, &c., with certain other perquisites, and who might be dismissed at a minute's warning on receiving three months' wages, is not rateable to the poor as the occupier of the house provided by the society, she having no distinct apartments in the (0) Rex v. St. Bartholomew's Hospital, 4 Burr. 2405; Rex v. St. Luke's, 2 Burr. 1055; 1 W. Bl. 249. (p) Rex v. Waldo, Cald. 358; 1 Bott, 166, pl. 193. house but a bed-chamber, and her family not being allowed to live there (q). An exemption in a private statute of 12 Charles II., of lands given to charitable purposes, "from all public taxes, charges, and assessments whatsoever, civil or military," extends to the poor rates (r). The stat. 3 & 4 Will. IV. c. 30, after reciting that it was expedient that churches, chapels, and other places exclusively appropriated to public religious worship should be exempt from the payment of poor and church rates, enacted, "that from and after the first day of October, 1833, no person or persons shall be rated or shall be liable to be rated, or to pay to any church or poor rates or cesses, for or in respect of any churches, district churches, chapels, meeting-houses, or premises, or such part thereof as shall be exclusively appropriated to public religious worship, and which (other than churches, district churches, and episcopal chapels of the established church) shall be duly certified for the performance of such religious worship according to the provision of any act or acts now in force: provided always, that no person or persons shall be hereby exempted from any such rates or cesses for or in respect of any parts of such churches, district churches, chapels, meeting houses, or other premises which are not so exclusively appropriated, and from which parts not so exclusively appropriated such person or persons shall receive any rent or rents, or shall derive profit or advantage." The second section provides, "that no person or persons shall be liable to any such rates or cesses because the said churches, district churches, chapels, meeting-houses, or other premises, or any vestry rooms belonging thereto, or any part thereof, may be used for Sunday or infant schools, or for the charitable education of the poor." Before the above act, a building used for a chapel only, if a profit was made of it, was rateable to the poor (s). Although it had been held that the trustees of a quakers' (q) Rex v. Field, 5 T. R. 587. (s) Robson v. Hyde, Cald. 310; Rex v. Agar, 14 East, 256. meeting-house, of which no profit was made by the pews, &c., were not rateable (t). By 9 Geo. IV. c. 40, s. 29, it is enacted, "that in all future rates, taxes, and levies to be made for any parish or place, in which any land or ground already purchased or to be purchased under the provisions of that or any former act, for the purposes of any county lunatic asylum, shall be situate, such land or ground with any buildings to be erected thereon, shall not be assessed to any such rates, taxes, or levies, at a higher value, and more improved rent than the same land or ground was, at the time of such purchase; nor shall any building or buildings, which under that or any former act has been or shall be erected on such land, be assessed to any house or window tax." The application of the rent, paid by the occupier, to charitable purposes, does not exempt him. Thus, hospital lands are chargeable to the poor as well as others; for no man, by appropriating his lands to an hospital, can exempt them from taxes to which they were subject before, and throw a greater burthen upon his neighbours (u). The principle of exemption in certain cases is, that there is no occupier. The comptroller of Chelsea College, who resided in it, was held to be rateable to the relief of the poor of the parish in respect of apartments held distinctly and separately for his own use (v). So the porter and butler of a college are rateable for their dwelling-houses erected for them by and belonging to the college, if they have the entire use of them, without the college's intermeddling therewith (w). The master of a free school, appointed by the minister and inhabitants of a parish under a charitable trust, who was the beneficial occupier of a house and garden, was held to be rateable, although they were enjoyed by him as a recompense (t) Rex v. Woodward, 5 T. R. 79; 1 Nolan, 162. See Rex v. Sculcoates, 12 East, 40. (u) 2 Salk. 527; 1 Bott, 125, pl. 154. (v) Ayr v. Smallpiece, 1 Bott, 131, pl. 165. (w) Rex v. Gardner, Cowp. 81. for teaching. The house and garden were assigned by deed "for the habitation and use of the master and his family freely, without payment of any rent, income, gift, sum of money, or other allowance whatsoever, for or out of the same," which, together with certain lands and annuities, were given for the teaching of ten boys, sons of the meaner sort of the inhabitants of the parish. But, if the master had been put in merely to look after the pupils, and had not occupied the house, he would not have been rateable; but it appeared that he was the beneficial occupier of the house and garden (y). So Lord Rich, having founded a corporation in the parish of F. for the relief of the poor there, granted to the corporation, and their successors, a messuage, twenty acres of land, and four of wood; and appointed the messuage for an almshouse for the dwelling and lodging of five poor and impotent persons, with a grave woman to attend them; the said six persons to have freely, during their lives, by the permission of the corporation, their dwelling-chambers and lodgings in the said almshouse, with the hall, kitchen, buttery, cellars, barns, and all profits and commodities to the said almshouse belonging; and, also, that the said corporation should permit them to have and occupy the said land for their cattle, and a rood of wood each year for firing; the persons elected, in case of nonconformity to the regulations of the charity, being liable to be put from his or her room or place, lodging and living, &c. as if the party so refusing were dead. Six persons, who had not been previously parishioners where the premises lay, possessed the said messuage, land, and wood, being of the annual value of 157., which were never rated before; keeping up a stock of cows, according to the founder's directions, and paying a labourer for making their hay and cutting their wood, both of which they disposed of to their The visitor of the said almshouse had frequently granted them additional relief. The Court of King's Bench was of opinion, on a case stated by the sessions, that the alms own use. (y) Rex v. Catt, 6 T. R. 332. people were liable to assessment if the parish officers thought it prudent to rate them. For the property came within the general description of rateable property in the statute 43 Eliz. c. 2, which contains no exception of lands devoted to charitable purposes; and these persons ploughing, sowing and reaping for their own benefit, had every sort of occupation which any other person could have, and the smallness of the benefit cannot constitute an exemption (z). The objects of a charity in the actual occupation of almshouses, paying no rent for the same, and removable at the pleasure of the patrons of the charity, are rateable to the relief of the poor in respect of their occupation. The master and wardens of the Merchant Tailors' Company, London, being patrons of a charitable establishment for the relief of the widows of poor freemen of the company, purchased land, whereon they erected, out of their corporate fund, thirty almshouses for the reception of such poor widows. The poor women resident in these houses, as objects of the charitable establishment, paid no rent for the same, and were removable at the pleasure of the master, wardens, and court of assistants of the company of Merchant Tailors. On a question, whether the inhabitants of these houses were liable to be rated, it was held that this case was not distinguishable from that last cited; and that although the objects of the charity were described as poor persons, yet that there is no distinction in the statute between such persons and others; if they are occupiers of property from which they derive a benefit, they are rateable (a). The lunatic asylum at York was built, and the ground for it purchased, by voluntary contribution, and the property was conveyed to trustees, for the purpose of erecting thereon a lunatic asylum, and for such other purposes relative thereto as should be determined by the subscribers. The asylum was originally designed for parish paupers or other indigent persons; but the funds being insufficient, a limited number (z) Rex v. Munday & others, 1 East, 584. (a) Rex v. Green, 9 B. & C. 203; S. C. 4 M. & R. 164. |