Opinion
No. 34626.
June 9, 1941.
1. APPEAL AND ERROR.
A fact issue whether any particular beds or wards were separately set aside, designated, and maintained for use of charity patients must be resolved by Supreme Court in favor of city in proceedings relating to assessment of property of hospital, where peremptory instruction was granted against city.
2. TAXATION.
Where one or more wards, or equivalents thereof, were at all times available to charity patients, as well as services of staff physicians, more than enough patients to satisfy statutory requirements were received and treated without preliminary inquiry whether they were able to pay, and were continued to be cared for even though it was ascertained that they were unable to pay, that none was turned away or turned out, nurses and other servitors in hospital were not permitted to know who were or were not pay patients, and all income was used entirely for hospital purposes and not for profit, property of hospital was exempt from taxation, notwithstanding no particular beds or wards were separately set aside, designated, and maintained for use of charity patients (Code 1930, sec. 3108(f).)
APPEAL from circuit court of Adams county, HON. R.E. BENNETT, Judge.
Gerard H. Brandon, of Natchez, for appellant.
To make constitutional statute granting exemptions to a hospital which is a benevolent organization, maintaining one or more charity wards for charity patients, and where all of the income for said hospital is used entirely for the purposes thereof and no part of same for profit, there must be some wise purpose of public policy to be advanced to support the reason for the exemption granted, otherwise the statute would be unconstitutional.
City of Jackson v. Miss. Fire Ins. Co., 132 Miss. 415, 95 So. 845; Miller v. Lamar Life, 158 Miss. 753, 131 So. 282; City of Jackson v. Deposit Guaranty Bank Trust Co., 160 Miss. 752, 133 So. 195.
This record fails to show that this organization and the manner and method of its operation is effecting such purposes. Indeed, it fails to show that it is being conducted otherwise than as any other private hospital operated for profit and for the profit of those who have capital invested therein, by way of a reasonable return upon their money for the time of its investment and benefits to be attained by the use of the facilities thereby afforded.
The burden of establishing its right to exemption rested upon the appellee, and it had the burden to establish clearly its right thereto.
Barnes v. Jones, 139 Miss. 675, 103 So. 773, 43 A.L.R. 673; Gulfport B. L. Ass'n v. City of Gulfport, 155 Miss. 498, 124 So. 658; Magnolia B. L. Ass'n v. Miller, 128 So. 585, appeal dismissed, 282 U.S. 803, 75 L.Ed. 722; Parker v. State Tax Com., 178 Miss. 680, 174 So. 567; Adams County v. Nat. Box Co., 125 Miss. 598, 88 So. 168.
Statutes of this character must be strictly construed against the claimed exemption.
New Standard Club v. McRaven, 111 Miss. 92, 71 So. 289, Ann. Cas., 1918E, 274; Adams County v. Nat. Box Co., supra; Barnes v. Jones, supra; Teche Lines v. Bd. Sup. Forrest County, 165 Miss. 594, 142 So. 24, revised, 143 So. 486; Leaf Hotel Corp. v. City of Hattiesburg, 168 Miss. 304, 150 So. 779; Hollandale Ice Co. v. Bd. Sup. Washington County, 171 Miss. 515, 157 So. 689; Jackson Fertilizer Co. v. Stone, 173 Miss. 183, 162 So. 170; Chapman v. State, 179 Miss. 507, 176 So. 391.
All reasonable doubts as to whether a claimant to exemption is entitled thereto, under the rule of strict construction must be resolved against the allowance of exemption under the facts of the particular case and the statute being construed.
Greenville Ice Coal Co. v. City of Greenville, 69 Miss. 86, 10 So. 574; Curry-Finch Brick Lbr. Co. v. Miller, 123 Miss. 850, 86 So. 579; Adams v. Y. M.V.R.R. Co., 77 Miss. 194, 24 So. 200, 317, 68 L.R.A. 33, affirmed 180 U.S. 1, 45 L.Ed. 395.
Certainly it was not the intention of the statute now under consideration to grant exemption to hospitals which "from time to time treat charity patients," as is the case at bar under the most favorable view that can be taken on behalf of the Natchez Sanatorium Benevolent Association on this record. It was the intent of the legislature to grant the exemption only to such sanatoriums or hospitals which regularly maintain facilities open at all times for the care and treatment of charity patients in one or more established wards, and furnish all needed services for such charity patients without charge being made therefor, not only including hospital accommodations and services for such patients, but the medical care and treatment of physicians and surgeons as well. The record in the case at bar does not disclose a single instance of any patient at the appellee Sanatorium having received the care and treatment of physicians without charge, or having the same furnished without charge by the Sanatorium or any regular staff of physicians or surgeons. In the case at bar there is no evidence that any rooms were set apart for charity patients.
Sub-sec. G, chap. 129, General Laws of Miss., 1938; Bd. of Sup'rs, Warren County, v. Vicksburg Hospital, 173 Miss. 805, 163 So. 382; Bd. of Sup'rs, Hinds County, v. Jackson Hospital Benevolent Ass'n, 180 Miss. 129, 177 So. 27; Rush Hospital Benev. Ass'n v. Bd. of Sup'rs, Lauderdale County, 187 Miss. 204, 192 So. 829.
L.C. Gwin, T.L. Bauer, and L.A. Whittington, all of Natchez, for appellee.
We think that the record is clear upon the proposition that the appellee was operating, and its property used for hospital purposes; that all the income from said hospital was used entirely for the purposes thereof and no part of the same for profit.
Bd. of Sup'rs v. Vicksburg Hospital, 163 So. 383, 173 Miss. 805; Bd. of Sup'rs, Hinds County, v. Jackson Hospital Benev. Ass'n, 177 So. 27, 180 Miss. 129; and Rush Hospital Benev. Ass'n v. Bd. of Sup'rs, 192 So. 829, 187 Miss. 204, cannot be successfully distinguished from the intant case.
While appellee had the burden of proving such facts as would bring it within the purview of the statute granting the exemption, we submit to the court that this statute should not be strictly construed against a claimed exemption, nor should all reasonable doubts as to whether appellee is entitled thereto be resolved against it and the cases cited by appellant have no application to this case.
Adams County v. Catholic Diocese of Natchez, 71 So. 17, 110 Miss. 890; State v. Fisk University, 87 Tenn. 241, 10 S.W. 286; Sub-sec. G, chap. 129, Laws of 1938.
The proof is undisputed in this case that at all times during the year 1940, from a date prior to January 1st of that year, it had "set aside" one or more rooms for charity patients. This proof goes further than the statute requires. The language of the statute is that "the property of organizations . . . which maintain one or more charity wards that are for charity patients . . ." shall be entitled to exemption. Even if the court should be of the opinion that the proof in this case is insufficient to establish the fact that appellee had set aside specific rooms at all times during the year for charity patients, we submit that it is still inescapable that the undisputed proof is that appellee at all times "maintained" one or more charity wards for charity patients.
We submit that by holding in efficiency, keeping up, carrying on and bearing the expense of one or more charity wards for charity patients; by consistently accepting all applicants for treatment as charity patients and turning none away and by giving such patients exactly the same treatment and care accorded all other patients, pay or otherwise, and by placing such charity patients in the same beds, rooms or wards used alike by pay patients, that appellee has strictly complied with the letter and the spirit of the statute.
It seems to be more to the public interest that charity patients be accorded treatment as would naturally follow from the adoption of the liberal meaning of the word "maintain" in construing the statute than would be the case should the strained construction inferentially argued for by appellant be placed thereon.
Were the statute to require that specific numbered rooms be set aside for charity patients it could conceivably result that an institution primarily operating for profit would neglect that portion of its building in the matter of expenditures for the comfort and treatment of patients therein and that distinctions might be made in the care and treatment accorded such patients by nurses and others to whom it was entrusted. Doubtless the Legislature, in adopting the statute, had such possibilities in mind.
Argued orally by Gerard Brandon, for appellant, and by L.C. Gwin, for appellee.
There is no substantial differentiation between this case and Board of Supervisors v. Jackson Hospital Benevolent Ass'n, 180 Miss. 129, 177 So. 27, unless it can be found in the fact that in the latter case four of its beds were devoted to charity patients, while in the case now before us there is an issue of fact whether any particular beds or wards were separately set aside, designated, and maintained for the use of charity patients; and we must resolve that issue in favor of appellant in view of the fact that a peremptory instruction was granted against it by the trial judge.
It is, nevertheless, substantially undisputed that within the hospital one or more wards, or the equivalents thereof, were at all times available to charity patients, as well as the services of the staff physicians; that both in number and in point of time more than enough patients to satisfy the statutory requirements were received and treated without any preliminary inquiry whether they were or were not able to pay, and were continued to be cared for even though it was ascertained that they were unable to pay; that none were turned away or were turned out, and that nurses and other servitors in the hospital were not permitted to know who were pay patients or who were being cared for and treated without pay — an arrangement which would likely provide better attention to and accommodations for those who were in fact charity patients.
Under modern conditions, especially as respects serious personal injuries, now happening with more frequency than in the past, it is important in the public interest that persons so injured or taken suddenly and seriously ill shall be immediately treated and cared for at the nearest hospital which may be reached, and that this treatment and attention shall have no such delay or embarrassment as would be consequent upon inquiry or question first to be made whether the injured or ill person is able to pay or whether some other person will stand security therefor, and that a person thereafter found unable to pay shall not be turned out on that account; and it was for the furtherance of such a service that subparagraph (f), Sec. 3108, Code 1930, has found its way into our exemption statutes.
If and when a hospital furnishes the services in the manner set forth in the two paragraphs next foregoing, it will not be necessary to separately set aside, designate, and maintain for the sole or exclusive use of charity patients any particular ward or wards, so long as one or more wards or the equivalent thereof are either being actually used by, or else are always available to, charity patients, not from time to time but always; and provided all the income, after the payment of the debts upon its property and the betterment of the property, is used entirely for hospital purposes, and none of it for profit, the thought being that if profit making for the owners or stockholders as such were allowed, this would tend to diminish the facilities and services which otherwise would be made available to those unable to pay or to fully pay therefor, and thus would work to the detriment of the benevolent objects of the exemption statute.
The facts of this case when given a reasonable, as distinguished from a strained or technical, interpretation are sufficient to bring appellee within the requirements aforementioned, and, therefore, within the privileges of the cited exemption statute, from which it follows that the correct result was reached by the judgment of the circuit court.
Affirmed.