Sidebilder
PDF
ePub
[blocks in formation]
[blocks in formation]

See End of Index for Tables of Northeastern Cases in State Reports

[merged small][ocr errors]

THE

NORTHEASTERN REPORTER

VOLUME 144

(312 IIL 367)

DUNCAN, J. The assessor of Plainfield

YATES et al. v. BOARD OF REVIEW OF township, Will county, assessed against H. WILL COUNTY. (No. 15810.)

(Supreme Court of Illinois. April 14, 1924.

Rehearing Denied June 12, 1924.)

I. Taxation 244-Trust fund to be held by church trustees and distributed In certain manner held "used exclusively for religious purposes" exempting it from taxation.

A trust fund in notes and securities es

tablished by a will under which the property is to be held intact by church trustees and the income therefrom to be used in a designated manner, that is, a designated amount a year to purchase library books for the church, a designated amount to pay the salary of the church organist, and the remainder, yearly, to the minister as part payment of his salary, which fund has been owned and administered by the trustees in accordance with the will, held used exclusively for religious purposes and hence exempt from taxation, under Revenue Act, § 2.

[Ed. Note. For other definitions, see Words and Phrases, First and Second Series, Exclusively Used.]

2. Taxation 241(1)-Employees of charitable institution not compelled to perform free services to constitute institution a charitable

one.

The employees of a charitable institution are not compelled to perform free services in order that the institution may be charitable.

Certificate of Appeal to Review Decision of Board of Review of Will County.

Complaint by H. W. Yates and others, as trustees of the Methodist Episcopal Church of Plainfield, with the Board of Review of Will County, to have set aside an assessment on certain property. The Board denied relief and dismissed the complaint, and on prayer for appeal the Tax Commission certified the record of the Board to the Supreme Court, pursuant to Revenue Act 1898, § 35, par. 6, as amended in 1923. Order reversed. Barr & Barr, of Joliet, for appellants. Robert W. Martin, State's Atty., of Joliet, for appellee.

W. Yates, H. C. Klett, John R. Birkett, Rob-
ert R. Jamieson, Louis J. Smith, R. H. Pen-
nington, and Harvey J. Levee, trustees of
the Methodist Episcopal Church of Plainfield,
$15,000 under the head of "Moneys" for the
year 1923. The trustees filed a complaint
with the board of review of Will county
claiming said property to be exempt from
taxation because it was owned and used ex-
The board

clusively for religious purposes.
of review entered an order finding said prop-
erty subject to taxation, and dismissed the
complaint. Thereupon the trustees prayed
an appeal, and the tax commission has cer-
tified the record of the board of review to
this court for review under paragraph 6 of
section 35 of the Revenue Act of 1898, as
amended in 1923 (Laws 1923, p. 498).

The property assessed is a trust fund of $30,000 in notes and other securities established by the will of John D. Schreffler, deceased. By the terms of the will the property is to be held intact by the trustees, and the income therefrom is to be used as follows: Twenty-five dollars a year to purchase new library books for the church, $50 a year to pay the salary of the organist of the church, and the remainder, yearly, to the minister of the church as part payment of his salary. The property has been owned and administered by the trustees in accordance with the

terms of the will for the past 12 years. The income from the property is about $1,500 a year. The salary of the minister has been $2,000 a year. The church has 198 members and owns its church building, which is located in Plainfield, a village of about 1,000 inhabitants. Religious services, including Sunday school instruction, are held in the church regularly and are conducted by the minister. Music is furnished at the services by the organist.

[1, 2] Section 2 of the Revenue Act, as amended by Act June 28, 1915, Laws 1915, p. 576 (Smith-Hurd Rev. St. 1923, c. 120), exempts from taxation "all property used exclusively for religious purposes, or used exclusively for school and religious purposes or for or

For other cases see same topic and KEY-NUMBER in all Key-Numbered Digests and Indexes
144 N.E.-1

phanages and not leased or otherwise used salary paid him only inures to his profit perwith a view to profit." The only question insonally. this case is whether or not the property as- What we have said as to the money paid sessed is used exclusively for religious purposes. As we view the question the property is clearly exempt from taxation, and it is difficult to perceive how a different conclusion could be reached. The property is to be owned and held intact exclusively for the purposes therein mentioned. It cannot be used otherwise under the terms of the will, and no other person can legally possess this property except the trustees and for the purposes aforesaid. It cannot be doubted that the church music furnished by the organist is part of the religious services and the Sunday school services conducted at that church. The organist is just as essential in furnishing that part of the religious services as is the organ itself. No one, certainly, would contend that the organ played by the organist is not an essential instrument in the performance of a part of those services, and it is clearly exempt from taxation because used exclusively for religious purposes and in religious exercises in the church. The salary of the organist must necessarily be paid by the church, and the money thus paid, it is equally clear, is expended exclusively for religious purposes. The fact that this money may be taxable after it is paid to the organist, or that the things purchased with it by the organist may be taxable in his or her hands, makes no difference in the determination of this question. The employees of a charitable institution are not compelled to perform free services in order that the institution may be charitable. If that were true, charitable institutions could not employ janitors or other persons to do services for them of any kind without the danger of losing their character as charitable institutions. Church music is by many religious organizations regarded as one of the essentials of religious services. The best church organist is the one most desired, and our law exempting church property could not be reasonably construed as denying to any church organization the right to have the best organist within its means, and to be allowed to pay the salary for the same, without subjecting itself to the charge that it is an organization for profit. While the organist is essential to the exercises of the church in question, still the organist is not the corporation and is not necessarily an officer of the corporation or a part of it, and, if he were, that would The order of the board of review is rehave no tendency to take away from it its versed. standing as a charitable institution, as the Order reversed.

to the organist as salary is equally true as to that paid to the minister on his salary. The minister's services, as such, are a necessary part of the religious services, and the money spent for his salary is necessarily money spent or used for religious purposes, and it is exclusively used for religious purposes when it is thus paid or spent. Of course, the money in the hands of the minister is taxable, and so is all other property that he purchases with it, but this has no tendency to show that the $30,000, or the income therefrom, is not used exclusively for religious purposes in the hands of the trustees. It is the intended use of the trust fund and the actual use made of it and the income therefrom that determine the question whether it is exempt from taxation, and not what becomes of the income after it is thus used.

The nearest case parallel to the one now in hand that this court has decided is Monticello Seminary v. Board of Review, 249 Ill. 481, 94 N. E. 938, in which we held that $35,000 donated to the Monticello Seminary for the purpose of furnshing free scholarships, to be paid out of the annual income of that endowment, was exempt from taxation. The gift in that case as in this was for a specific purpose--a charity-and we held that theincome from it was not a profit in any sense in which that word can properly be used. That case is so clearly decisive of the one now in hand that we deem is unnecessary to cite further authorities.

The $25 a year to be spent for books for the church is so clearly money used or to be used for religious purposes that no further argument or comment seems to be necessary.

The cases cited by appellee holding parsonages and other such property not exempt are not at all analogous to the question now in hand. A parsonage used by the minister as a home for himself and family is used and occupied just like any other home when the minister is put in possession of it, and when he uses it as his home it is in his possession and use as such, and it cannot be said to be then in use by the church for religious purthat of the salary of the minister after it poses. Such property is more analogous to has been paid to him. For the foregoing reasons we have held that the holding by a church of such property is for secular and not religious purposes.

« ForrigeFortsett »