Mullen v. McKinney

• Decision Date: 03 November 1890
• Docket Number: 196
• Citation: 138 Pa. 69,20 A. 940
• Parties: R. R. TOB. MULLEN v. S. H. McKINNEY ET AL
• Court: Pennsylvania Supreme Court

20 A. 940

138 Pa. 69

R. R. TOB. MULLEN v. S. H. McKINNEY ET AL

No. 196

Supreme Court of Pennsylvania

November 3, 1890

Argued October 11, 1890

APPEAL BY DEFENDANTS FROM THE COURT OF COMMON PLEAS OF VENANGO COUNTY.

No. 196 October Term 1890, Sup. Ct.; court below, No. 1 August Term 1890, C.P. in equity.

On August 24, 1889, the Right Reverend Tobias Mullen, Bishop of Erie for St. Patrick's Church, Franklin, Pa., filed a bill in equity against S. H. McKinney and others commissioners of Venango county, and S. A. Hull, collector of taxes, praying, upon the matters therein charged, for an injunction to restrain the defendants from collecting taxes levied for county and poor purposes for the year 1889, upon an assessment of the "Catholic Parsonage, lot No 187," at a valuation of $3,000.

On November 4, 1889, a motion for a preliminary injunction having been heard upon bill and affidavits, the court TAYLOR, P.J., filed the following opinion:

The bill charges that the complainant is the owner, in trust for St. Patrick's Roman Catholic Church, of two certain in-lots situate in the city of Franklin, Pa., and that in 1881 the congregation completed the erection of a church upon one of the lots, which has since been used exclusively as an actual place of religious worship, and that as the congregation increased in numbers it became necessary to erect an addition to said church building for the purposes of religious worship and the accommodation of its pastor; that the addition to said church building was completed in March, 1889, and that the plan, a draft of the original building with the addition, is attached to and made a part of the bill; that the addition is physically attached to the original building in such manner that it forms an integral part of the old church building, and cannot be separated therefrom without the destruction of the building; that the wing or attachment of the new building to the old is used as the office of the church, in which the entire business of the church is transacted, the records of the church are kept, Sunday school classes are taught, etc., and that the room marked "E," upon the draft, is the church chapel, where mass is said and the children of the congregation are religiously instructed; that these two rooms are used for religious services and places of worship, and that the remainder of the new addition is used as a parsonage for the priest; that the county commissioners have assessed the new addition, before described, for county and poor purposes, and levied a tax thereon, and that the defendant Hull, as collector, has levied upon the personal property of the complainant and will proceed to sell the same to collect said tax, unless restrained by the court.

There were three affidavits read in support of the bill, and the prayer is that the defendants be enjoined from collecting this tax, and for further relief.

Upon the part of the defendants, there was one affidavit introduced, that of S. H. McKinney, one of the defendant commissioners. It sets out that the new building stands entirely upon one of the lots; that it was erected for a parsonage; that the two buildings are entirely separate and distinct; that the walls and the roof are separate, and that the new building could be entirely removed without in any way involving the disintegration of the church building; and that, although a Sunday school class may be taught occasionally in one of the rooms and mass said occasionally in the other, the old church building is where the Sunday school is held and mass ordinarily is said, and that the attachment of the new building to the old church, in the manner by the defendant alleged, is but for the purpose of escaping taxation upon the parsonage.

The three affidavits in support of the bill squarely contradict the material facts as alleged in the defendants' affidavit, as to the construction of the building, the purpose of its erection, and the use that is made of a part thereof. Mr. Ramsdale, the architect, says he constructed the new building; that it was built with the view to use a part of it for religious worship, that the addition is joined to the...