ABSTRACT

The most common source of precedent in searching for the meaning of the tax law's concept of the charity is the law of charitable trusts. Trusts are ancient legal instruments that accomplish a variety of purposes, the primary of which is to separate the ownership and control of assets from their beneficial use. Charitable trusts are those whose assets are used for especially worthy purposes. Charitable trust law came into prominence in 1601 with the Elizabethan Statute of Charitable Uses, which strengthened the mechanisms for preventing the misuse of assets given to charitable purposes. The statute's preamble catalogued the various purposes for which charitable trusts had until then been established. Despite unanimity of authority that the tax law concept of charity was drawn from charitable trust law, considerable theoretical difficulties exist in extending this per se approach to tax exemption. The primary deficiency is encountered under the deservedness criterion.