persons were afterwards admitted, at certain rates of payment, varying from six shillings to three guineas a week. From this and other sources of revenue, the trustees, after paying all the expenses of the establishment, had accumulated, in five years, profits to the amount of 2,000l., part of which had been laid out in buildings and purchases for the institution, and part continued to accumulate. All benefactors of 201. or upwards were governors, and they exercised the entire control over the asylum and its funds. Neither the trustees nor subscribers derived any profit whatever from the institution. The trustees being rated to the poor for this asylum, appealed, on the ground that the asylum was not rateable by law, and even if rateable, that the trustees were not the proper persons to be assessed. But the court held, that, as profit was made by the reception of patients who could pay, the asylum was liable to be rated for it, and that the application of the profit when made was immaterial to the question of rateability; also, that the trustees, being, in law, the owners of the asylum, were properly rated; no other persons could be rated; certainly not the unhappy patients; and as to the servants, they were not the occupiers (b). By the general highway act, 5 & 6 Will. IV. c. 50, s. 27, in order to raise money for carrying the several purposes of that act into execution, it is enacted, "that a rate shall be made, assessed, and levied, by the surveyor, upon all property now liable to be rated and assessed to the relief of the poor: provided that the same rate shall also extend to such woods, mines, and quarries of stone as had theretofore been usually rated to the highways" (c). Church rates which have existed from time immemorial, are imposed upon the occupiers of lands or houses, upon principles resembling the rules in force for the making of poor rates, with the exception, that all property forming a part of the rectory, whoever may be the occupier, is ex (b) Rex v. St. Giles, York, 3 B. & & R. 334; S. C. 9 B. & C. 479; Adol. 573. Rex v. Lacy, 8 Dowl. & R. 457; (c) See Chauter v. Glubb, 4 Mann. S. C. 5 B. & C. 702. empted from church rates (d). The payment of a rate not exceeding 107. due from one individual may be enforced by distress by magistrates (e). In other cases, the ecclesiastical court exercises jurisdiction. Greenwich Hospital was founded in 1694, and was part of an ancient demesne, to which an unconsecrated chapel, chaplains, and a burial ground are attached; but the officers of which occasionally bury, christen, marry, have pews at and resort to, the parish church, and vote at the vestry. It has been decided that the governor is liable to be assessed to the church rate for premises in his beneficial occupation as governor, although the premises had never been so rated before, but no valid ground of exemption was shown to found a prescription (f). But the inhabitants of that hospital, consisting of disabled seamen, the objects of that charity, inmates only because they are incapable of maintaining themselves, are not liable to be rated to the church rate, upon the same principle as they are exempt from the poor rate (g). The statute 48 Geo. III. c. 55, granting the assessed taxes, contains the following exemptions from the window tax. Any hospital, charity school, or house provided for the reception and relief of poor persons, except such apartments therein as are or may be occupied by the officers or servants thereof, which shall be severally assessed, and be subject to the said duties, as entire dwelling houses. The windows in any room of a dwelling house, licensed according to law as a chapel for the purposes of Divine worship, and used for no other purpose whatsoever. Every such hospital, charity school, house for the reception and relief of poor persons, or room licensed as a chapel (d) See 1 Burn's Eccl. Law, 378 -388; Prideaux on Churchwardens by Tyrw. 86-108, 8th ed. Miller v. Bloomfield, 1 Addams, 499. The bill introduced in the House of Lords (Feb. 1836) for altering the jurisdiction of ecclesiastical courts, contains provisions for transferring the jurisdiction as to church rates to justices of the peace. (e) 53 Geo. III. c. 127. (f) Smith and Moze v. Keats, 4 Hagg. 275. (g) S. C. Ibid. 282. as aforesaid, are directed to be charged by the assessors, or stated on the certificate of assessments as such, and on proof of the ground of exemption, may be discharged by the commissioners (h). Charity schools, hospitals, and houses for the reception or relief of poor persons, were also exempted from the inhabited house duty (i), which has been repealed (j). SECTION IV. Of the Provisions respecting Charities in the Statutes relating to the Land Tax. THE annual land tax acts, from the 4 Will. & Mary, c. 1, invariably contained an exemption in favour of any college or hall in either of the two universities of Oxford or Cambridge, or the colleges of Windsor, Eton, Winton, Westminster, or Bromley, or any hospital, in respect of the sites of the said colleges, &c., or any of the buildings within the walls or limits thereof; or any master, fellow, or scholar, or exhibitioner of any such college or hall, or any masters or ushers of any school, in respect of any stipend, wages, rents, profits, or exhibitions whatsoever, arising or growing due to them in respect of the said places or employments in the said universities, colleges, or schools; and also any houses, which, on or before March 25, 1693, did belong to the sites of any college or hall, or to Christ's Hospital, St. Bartholomew's, Bridewell, St. Thomas's, and Bethlem, or any other hospitals, or almshouses, in respect of any rents or revenues, which before that time were payable to them, being to be received and disbursed for the immediate use and relief of the poor of the said hospitals and almshouses only. Provided that it should not discharge any tenant of any of the houses or lands belonging to the said colleges, halls, or schools, who, by their leases or other contracts were obliged to pay all rates, taxes, and impositions, but that they should be rated and pay (h) 48 Geo. III. c. 55. Sched. (A). (j) 4 & 5 Will. IV. c. 19. (i) Ibid. Sched. (B). the same. Provided also, that all such lands, revenues, and rents, settled to any charitable or pious use, as were assessed in the 4th year of William and Mary (k), should be liable to be charged; and that no other lands, tenements, hereditaments, revenues, or rents whatsoever then settled to any charitable or pious uses as aforesaid, should be charged (7). By stat. 38 Geo. III. c. 60, the land tax was made perpetual, but subject to redemption under certain rules and conditions. The consideration for redemption shall, generally speaking, be so much capital stock of the three per centum consolidated annuities, or reduced annuities, as will yield a dividend exceeding the amount of the land tax redeemed by one-tenth part thereof. This stock may be transferred by the purchaser at once, or by instalments; and, in certain cases, the redemption may be made by payments in money. This act was afterwards amended, and the provisions were consolidated, by 42 Geo. III. c. 116; and further amendments have been since made (m). In Harrison v. Bulcock (n), on the question, whether a clause in the land tax act then in force, exempting hospitals and "any of the buildings within the walls or limits of such hospital," extended to buildings newly added to an hospital on land not forming part of its original site, and which had previously paid land tax; it was held that such buildings were exempted. Buildings of a college in one of the universities, taken into and made part of the college between the passing of the first land tax act and the act which made that tax perpetual, (k) 38 Geo. III. c. 5, ss. 25, 26, 29. (1) This question is to be settled by the commissioners, 1 H. Bl. 72. (m) 53 Geo. III. c. 142; 57 Geo. III. c. 100; 1 & 2 Will. IV. c. 21, as to double assessments. New commissioners were appointed by 7 & 8 Geo. IV. c. 75; 9 Geo. IV. c. 38; 2 & 3 Will. IV. c. 127; 3 & 4 Will. IV. c. 95. See Tyrw. & Tynd. Dig. of Statutes, 442-475, Suppl. 135-137; 4 & 5 Will. IV. c. 60; 5 & 6 Will. IV. c. 20. On the construction of the land tax redemption and sale acts, see Williams v. Steward, 3 Mer. 472. On contracts between landlord and tenant as to payment of taxes, see Woodfall by Harrison, 349–353, 2nd ed. (n) 1 H. Bl. 68; cited 3 B. & Adol. 170. are exempted from the land tax. But where a college soon after the passing of the first land tax act, purchased land of a parish under a private act of parliament, which provided that the college should pay all taxes which the premises then were, or should thereafter be, subject to; it was held that the lands purchased were not exempted from the land tax (0). All bodies politic and corporate, notwithstanding any statutes of mortmain or other acts of parliament, and all feoffees and trustees for charitable and other public purposes, having any estate or interest in any manors, lands, or hereditaments subject to the land tax, may contract for the redemption of the whole or part thereof (p). For the purpose of redeeming any land tax charged on any hereditaments belonging to any bodies politic, or companies, or any feoffees or trustees for charitable or other public purposes, such lands may be sold or mortgaged, or rent-charges granted thereout, and copyholds may be enfranchised (q). The governors of the charity for the relief of the poor widows and children of clergymen, with the consent and under the direction of the commissioners, may sell any manors, lands, &c. given to them by will, either generally for the relief of such widows or children, or subject to any qualifications or restrictions as to the mode of applying such relief, in extent of the allowance to be made to individuals, and apply the proceeds to redeem the land tax charged on any other manors, lands, &c. vested in them for the purposes of such charity (r). Personal property in the funds or on mortgage, in the names of corporations or trustees for charitable or other public purposes, and liable to be invested in the purchase of lands in trust for such corporations, &c. may, with the consent of the commissioners under the great seal, or of the court having the control of the funds, be (0) All Souls' College v. Costar, 3 Bos. & Pull. 635. See Downing College, Cambridge, v. Purchas, 3 B. & Adol. 162, as to the liability of that college to the payment of rates as part of the university under acts of parliament passed before the |