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TMI Blog1943 (6) TMI 1X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... t contention of the Revenue is right. The Special Commissioners accepted the view put before them by the Revenue; and their finding is contained in paragraph 13 of the case, where they say this: "Having considered the arguments and evidence adduced before us, we held that the society was not a body of persons established for charitable purposes only, and we refused the society's claims for exemption from income tax". The preliminary argument presented by the Solicitor-General was to the effect that that finding was, or involved, a finding of fact which was binding upon this Court. He quoted some observations of Lord Hanworth, when Master of the Rolls, in the case of Inland Revenue Commissioners v. Yorkshire Agricultural Society [1928] 1 K.B. 611; 13 Tax Cas. 58, from which it would appear that in Lord Hanworth's opinion the question whether or not a body of persons was "established for charitable purposes" would, in certain circumstances, be a question of fact. With all respect, I cannot accept that view. It is the business of the Commissioners to find facts. It is a question of law whether, upon the facts so found, the particular body in question is a ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... and the question is whether, on the facts as appearing in the body of the case, the Commissioners rightly came to that conclusion. Macnaghten, J., held that they did not; and I agree with him. The respondents are a body of ten gentlemen who carry on the work which has been carried on since 1871 by the unincorporated body originally named the "Royal Albert Hall Choral Society". In the petition to which I have referred the history of the society is set out and the method in which it was conducted; and the work which it was doing is given in some detail. That was in the year 1927. In the case it is stated that the objects specified in a later document drawn up in 1939 have been the objects of the society from the date of its foundation. In point of fact in 1939 a constitution and rules were drawn up, and the respondents carry on their work to-day under that constitution and rules. The object as they are there set out are, as the Commissioners find, precisely the same as the objects for which the society has been carried on from the date of its foundation. The objects as stated in the petition were "for the purpose of providing choral concerts in the said hall"-th ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... its merits I know nothing; nor is there any evidence or finding about that. The argument for the Crown raised a number of points. First of all it was said, and said truly, that the problem is to ascertain the purpose for which this society was established. I think that this proposition is incontrovertible. It was then said that the purpose for which it was established may be regarded from three points of view: first of all, the purpose of the ten gentlemen who constitute the society; secondly, the purpose from the point of view of the choir which is trained and performs; and, thirdly, from the point of view of the public who go to hear the performances. It was said that, when those are all looked at, the real purpose must be taken to be not one which is educational or otherwise charitable, but one which is of pure entertainment. The public goes to be entertained; the singers sing in order to have the pleasure of singing; and the ten gentlemen encourage and assist those operations in order to have the pleasure of running a choir and listening to the performances. Those, it was said, were the real purposes for which this body was established. With all respect to the argument, nothin ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... ion of education when one is dealing with aesthetic education. Very few people can become executants, or at any rate executants who can give pleasure either to themselves or to others; but a very large number of people can become instructed listeners with a trained and cultivated taste. In my opinion, a body of persons established for the purpose of raising the artistic taste of the country and established by an appropriate document which confines them to that purpose, is established for educational purposes, because the education of artistic taste is one of the most important things in the development of a civilised human being. In the case of artistic taste, one of the best ways of training it is by presenting works of high class, and gradually training people to like them in preference to works of an inferior class. The people who undergo this process go no doubt with the idea of being amused or entertained; but it is not the state of mind of the people who go to the performance which matters for the present purposes; it is the purpose of the people who provide it which is important. If the people who are providing the performance are really genuinely confining their objects to ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... ce of this society from the point of view of musical education. Sir George Dyson said: "It was broadly true that the society was the instrument by which everything that there is to be learned about choral music could be learned". He also said: "The society during its existence has made a large contribution to the higher forms of music which have to do with choral singing. The work of the society is a good means of making the country musical. He thought the vast majority of the performers joined the society because they wanted to exercise their musical faculties and wanted to get to know musical works". Then he refers to and agrees with the evidence given by Sir Hugh Allen, another member of the society, before the Joint Select Committee. Picking out one or two paragraphs from the report of that evidence, Sir Hugh Allen says this in answer to the question: "Do you regard these performances as a valuable element in the musical education of the country? (A) I do." Then he says: "I would like, if I may, to say to your Lordships that the Royal Choral Society during its fifty-five years of existence has made a very large contribution to the higher form ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... disposes of the arguments in this case. They have traversed a wide ground. I have done my best to compress what appeared to me to be the more important points which were brought forward. A considerable number of cases were mentioned, and I doubt very much whether any useful purpose would be served by going through them. But I ought, perhaps, to mention one paragraph in Tudor on Charities and the two cases there referred to ; because it seems to me that that paragraph in Tudor is inadequate and, indeed, if read in a certain sense, misleading. The passage is on page 39 of the 5th edition, and says: "The fine arts, however, are probably not regarded as objects of charity, and a gift to encourage artistic pursuits was held not charitable; but it is otherwise if the element of instruction is introduced. A gift for an art school is good". I do not know what that passage means when it says: "The fine arts are probably not regarded as objects of charity". Does it mean that education of artistic taste is not education in the charitable sense? If it does, I dissent from that most vehemently. There is not a particle of authority in support of such a view. If it means that ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... ducation in art. With the greatest respect to the learned Vice-Chancellor, he did not see how it was possible to get that meaning out of the words." I do not myself derive any assistance from that case: but it is worth pointing out that a gift merely "to encourage artistic pursuits" might be expended in a way that nobody would consider charitable: for instance, in merely providing perhaps for one or two individuals paints and paint-brushes, or a grant piano with which they could play in their drawing-room. I apprehend nobody would say that was a charitable object; but the money could have been spent for some such purpose as that. So far as authorities are of assistance, I find considerable support for the view I have ventured to put forward in the decision of P.O. Lawrence, J., as he then was, in the case of Shakespeare Memorial Trust, In re***. I do not propose to take up time in referring to the facts of that case; but, in many respects, particularly from the point of view of public education in matters of art, it falls into line with what I myself have said earlier in this judgment. In that case there happened one of those curious things that frequently happens w ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... dence, on both sides and then stated their conclusions, without making it clear in the least what evidence they accepted and what evidence they rejected. In the present case that difficulty has not arisen, because very early, and no doubt accurately, the SolicitorGeneral said that we were to treat the statement of the evidence which is set out as the evidence of Sir George Dyson as being accepted by the Commissioners. That has made our task a possible one; but if we had been asked to say that we must assume that they only accepted part of it, and rejected part of it, then I for myself should have thought that we might have to remit the case again to them. It may be (I hope it is not so) that the Commissioners do not always understand what the object of a case stated is. I say that because I thought there was a suggestion in the argument of the SolicitorGeneral which, if they heard it (though it was not so intended, of course) might mislead the Commissioners. The Solicitor-General said that their conclusion must be supported if there was any evidence to support it. He suggested, if we could find any evidence to support it, we must treat their decision as analogous to that of a jury ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... he conclusion that this was not a trust established for charitable purposes", then it would be apparent that it was a question of law. As it is they heard evidence, and I think they were fully entitled to hear evidence. The evidence was properly called. It might be called to rebut any suggestion that in fact the moneys in question were not applied to a charitable purpose only. It might properly be called to show that the apparent charitable intention of the rule had not been used as a cloak for the carrying on of entertainments, or pursuits of one sort or another which were not charitable at all. If one looks only at the rule, I am bound to say that it seems to me to be clear on the face of it that the trust was established for charitable purposes. I have tried to think what would be said by any lawyer to a person disposed to assist with his money the cause of one department of music. Supposing that a wealthy man had said to a lawyer versed in such matters: "I attach enormous importance to choral singing, and I want to establish a trust which will encourage that; will that be a charitable trust?" I can hardly imagine any lawyer would have said: "No, certainly n ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... body can learn to sing without exercising his musical faculties. If they take pleasure in exercising their musical faculties, as the Master of the Rolls has pointed out, that does not mean that they are not being taught and trained. It would be an unfortunate thing if preceptors and teachers in any department were told that they must realise that the moment their teaching was found to be giving any kind of pleasure and enjoyment to those who were under their instruction, they must know that they were failing in their duty. The other matter seems to me nothing to the point at all. That is the suggestion, as Sir George Dyson said, that audiences derived educational benefit from first-class musical performances, because it is the object of this trust to provide first-class musical performances. To say that it is also possible to derive educational benefit, as it is called, from entertainments produced by a producer working for commercial profit, seems to me to have nothing in the world to do with the point. Anybody who endows education, in the sense of education given at the universities, is undoubtedly setting up a charitable trust. It is quite true to say that there are people empl ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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