273 Pa. 194 | Pa. | 1922
Lead Opinion
Opinion by
Doctor Charles F. Taylor assigned to himself and three others the bulk of his personal property, amounting to more than $150,000, also the assets of a magazine known as the “Medical World,” in trust to apply the net income, inter alia, “to promote improvements in the structure and the methods of government, with a special reference to the initiative, referendum, and recall; proportional representation; preferential voting; ballot reform; the simplification of municipal, state and national government, and the revision or remaking of city charters, state constitutions and our national constitution, with a view to promote efficiency and popular control of government,” and providing further that the trustees should have “full power and authority to employ and pay lecturers and writers and such other assistants and employees as they may deem necessary for prop
The principal contention of appellant is that since the purpose of the trust was to secure radical changes in our system of government it is, accordingly, contrary to law and cannot be sustained. The word “charitable,” in a legal sense, includes every gift for a general public use, to be applied, consistent with existing laws, for the benefit of an indefinite number of persons, and designed to benefit them from an educational, religious, moral, physical or social standpoint. In its broadest meaning it is understood “to refer to something done or given for the benefit of our fellows or the public”: Knight’s Est., 159
Viewed in the light of the foregoing definitions the trust under consideration must be held to be for the benefit and welfare of the public in that its object is to promote improvements in the structure and methods of government, with a view to efficiency and popular contact and to use all lawful means to increase the knowledge of citizens on governmental and political questions.
Must it be held void because the successful attainment of these objects would involve a change in existing laws? We would hesitate to subscribe to such doctrine unless reason or authority compelled us to do
We find it difficult to reconcile the opposite conclusions reached by the Massachusetts court with respect to the different objects of the trust, since both contemplated a change in existing laws and, consequently, to that ex
We are led to conclude that a trust for a public charity is not invalid merely because it contemplates the procuring of such changes in existing laws as the donor deems beneficial to the people in general, or to a class for whose benefit the trust is created. To hold that an endeavor to procure by proper means a change in a law is
The decree of the lower court is affirmed at the costs of appellant.
Dissenting Opinion
Dissenting Opinion by
In this case, I would follow the rule laid down in Jackson v. Phillips, 14 Allen, (Mass.) 539, and determine that the trust is not a charity; therefore, I dissent.