Johnson City Tax Collector v. Mississippi Baptist Hospital
| Decision Date | 02 November 1925 |
| Docket Number | 25074 |
| Court | Mississippi Supreme Court |
| Parties | JOHNSON CITY TAX COLLECTOR v. MISSISSIPPI BAPTIST HOSPITAL. [*] |
Suggestion of Error Overruled. Nov. 30, 1925.
APPEAL from chancery court of Hinds county, First District, HON. V J. STRICKER, Chancellor.
Suit by the Mississippi Baptist Hospital against A. J. Johnson, tax collector of the city of Jackson, for an injunction. From a decree for complainant, defendant appeals. Reversed defendant's demurrer sustained, and cause remanded.
Judgment reversed, demurrer sustained, and cause remanded.
Green, Green & Potter, for appellant.
I. The Mississippi Hospital is owned by the Baptist Church, which is a religious society, and, under section 933, Code of 1906 the Baptist Hospital Corporation was organized in 1912. Section 934, Code of 1906, section 4110, Hemingway's Code, lists what property any religious society may hold and own at any one place. This does not embrace a hospital, and as this statute was the limit of authority for the granting of charters to religious societies, the chapter granted in 1912 to the Baptist Hospital, averred in the bill, authorizing it to build, construct and equip, maintain and carry on a hospital for the treatment of persons suffering from physical ailments and diseases, was unauthorized and void as being beyond the power granted by the legislature to religious societies to hold and own such property, and to engage in the erection and maintenance of hospitals.
There being no authority in the Mississippi Baptist Hospital to hold any real estate for hospital purposes, it follows that the exemptions under section 4251, Code of 1906, paragraphs D and F whereby all property, real and personal, belonging to any religious or charitable society, and used exclusively for the purpose of such society and not for profit is exempt from taxation, as, also property appropriated to and used for any hospital or charitable institution, were granted to religious and charitable societies having authority and power to hold and own property devoted to charitable purposes, but does not include a religious corporation which is forbidden by its charter, under section 934, to hold any such property, and, being without the right to hold any such property, it could not hold it in violation of the law as exempt.
II. If the court should hold adversely on the foregoing proposition, then the claim of exemption of the hospital does not exist under the constitution and laws of this state. See chapter 50, section 1, Laws of 1900, section 4252, Code of 1906, chapter 134, Laws of 1922, chapter 338, Laws of 1924. In the case at bar, after the assessment for 1924 was in process, chapter 338, Laws of 1924, on April 12, 1924, was passed, and the exemption, if existent at all, was repealed, and this determined the controversy adversely to appellee. Touching the power of the Baptist Church to own property, see Gunter v. City of Jackson, 94 So. 844, which is both enlightening and controlling.
It is worth noting that this Mississippi Baptist Hospital is not a public property, not a public benevolence, but is a corporation with a capital and earnings in which the earnings, according to the allegations of the bill, are to be invested by the trustees in increasing the value of the property and in improving the property. A public hospital is defined as one "created and endowed by the Government for general charity," and a private hospital as one "founded and maintained by a private person or corporation, the state or municipality having no voice in the management or control of its property or the formation of rules for its government." 30 C. J. 462.
III. Even if it should be held that the hospital on Lot "Q" was exempt property, the exemption should not extend to this training school for nurses, shown by the record, and which is an element in the business enterprise of the administration of the hospital whereby the services of these nurses are obtained at a nominal cost, in order that they may obtain an education, and the education of nurses is not a public charity, but a private enterprise.
Wherefore, we ask that the decree rendered in this case, be reversed and the injunction granted be dissolved.
George Butler, for appellee.
The question is whether or not two lots belonging to the Mississippi Baptist Hospital, one of which is used for a nurses' home, operated as an adjunct to and in connection with the Hospital, and the other used as a means of egress and ingress to the other two lots, are exempt from taxation. The exemption is claimed under paragraphs D and F, sections 4251 and 4252, Code of 1906, and section 1, chapter 134, Laws of 1922.
The hospital was incorporated under the laws of this state on or about January 11, 1922. The charter provides that its capital should consist of donations; that it should be a benevolent institution without dividends; all earnings would be invested in betterments and improvements; it was authorized to receive donations of money, real and personal property; authorized to build, construct, equip, maintain and carry on a hospital for the treatment of all persons suffering from physical ailments and diseases, and given all the rights and powers conferred upon corporations by chapter 24, Code of 1906, and amendments thereto.
The affairs of the corporation are managed by a board of trustees appointed from time to time by the Mississippi Baptist State Convention, the organization of which is outlined in detail in Gunter v. City of Jackson, 130 Miss. 637 and 686.
During the year 1924 the city assessed Lots 5 and 6, above mentioned, for ad valorem taxes. The city did not assess that part of Lot Q, mentioned above, upon which the main hospital building is located. Section 4252, Code of 1906, section 6883, Hemingway's Code, in substance provides that all property, real and personal, and the revenues derived therefrom, belonging to any religious or charitable society, where the revenues thereof are used for benevolent purposes, shall be exempt. This section was amended by chapter 338, Laws of 1924, leaving out all reference to exemptions in favor of religious or charitable societies. This amendment was effective April 12, 1924, long after the date on which the liability of this property for taxes was fixed.
I. The property in question is exempt under chapter 134, Laws of 1922. It will be noted that this statute extends the exemption to all property belonging to a religious, charitable or benevolent organization "which is used for hospital purposes," and which maintains one or more charity wards, where all the income from the hospital is used for the purposes thereof and no part for profit.
The question thus presented is whether Lots 5 and 6 of Block L are "used for hospital purposes." We do not maintain that they are absolutely indispensable to the hospital, but we do contend that they are proper and appropriate to effectuate the objects of the institution, and they are used for hospital purposes within the meaning of the statute.
This court heretofore has not applied a severe and strict rule, nor placed an unreasonable construction on statutes granting exemptions to religious, charitable or educational institutions. The fundamental ground upon which all such exemptions are based is a benefit conferred upon the public by such institutions and the consequent relief, to some extent, of the burden otherwise imposed upon the state to care for and advance the interest of its citizens. M. E. Church v. Hinton, 92 Tenn. 188, 19 L. R. A. 289.
The court had this fundamental ground in mind when it applied a logical and reasonable construction to the statutes in Preston v. City of Jackson, 93 Miss. 366; Adams v. Diocese of Natchez, 110 Miss. 890; Harrison County v. Military Academy, 126 Miss. 729, and the same rule has been applied in other states. Mattern v. Conevin, 213 Pa. St. 588; State v. Platt, 24 N.J.L. 109; State. v. Fisk University, 87 Tenn. 241, 10 S.W. 286; M. E. Church v. Hinton, 92 Tenn. 188, 19 L. R. A. 289; Vanderbilt University v. Cheney, 116 Tenn. 259; Commonwealth v. Y. W. C. A., 115 Va. 745, 50 L. R. A. (N. S.) 1197; Sisters of Charity v. Chatham, 52 N.J.L. 273; Firemen's Assn. v. Johnston, 62 N.J.L. 625; 37 Cyc. 930; Griswell College v. State, 46 Iowa 275, 26 Am. Rep. 138; County of Henepin v. Brotherhood of Gethsemane, 27 Minn. 400, 38 Am. Rep. 298, a case very similar to the one at bar.
See also Monticello Seminary v. People, 106 Ill. 398, 46 Am. Rep. 702; First Presbyterian Church v. New Orleans, 30 La. Ann. 259, 31 Am. Rep. 224; People ex rel. Mount Pleasant Academy v. Meitzer, 98 A.D. 237 (affirmed in 181 N.Y. 511), 73 N.E. 1130; Blackburn v. Houston, 39 La. Ann. 592, 2 So. 193; Dakota v. Ericson, 182 N.W. 315, 13 A. L. R. 1189; Chatham v. Sisters of Charity, 92 N.J.L. 409, 105 A. 204; State ex rel. Cunningham v. Board of Assessors, 52 La. Ann. 223, 26 So. 872; White v. Smith, 189 Pa. 223, 43 L. R. A. 498, 42 A. 125; Woman's Home Missionary Society v. Taylor, 173 Pa. 456, 34 A. 42.
The facts in this case show that the property here involved is used for hospital purposes within the meaning of chapter 134, Laws of 1922; that the institution maintains one or more charity wards for charity patients; that all income from the hospital is used entirely for the purposes thereof, and that no part of the same is used for profit.
By the demurrer it is admitted that similar training schools are conducted and maintained by all well-regulated modern hospitals; that some of the hospitals provide such nurses in training with homes and quarters in the hospital building proper, and others in annexes or wings annexed to, or adjoining the main hospital building; that all such nurses in training are...
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