Commissioners of Inland Revenue v National Anti-Vivisection Society
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judgment Date | 02 July 1947 |
| Date | 02 July 1947 |
| Court | King's Bench Division |
NO. 1382-HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE (KING'S BENCH DIVISION)-
COURT OF APPEAL-
HOUSE OF LORDS-
Income Tax - Exemption - Charitable purposes - Income Tax Act, 1918 (8 & 9 Geo. V, c. 40), Section 37 (1) (b).
The Respondent Society was a voluntary society governed by rules. Its object, as set out in the rules, was "to awaken the conscience of mankind "to the iniquity of torturing animals for any purpose whatever; to draw "public attention to the impossibility of any adequate protection from torture "being afforded to animals under the present law; and so to lead the people "of this country to call upon Parliament totally to suppress the practice of "vivisection." In 1898 the Council of the Society passed the following explanatory resolution: "The Council affirm that, while the demand for "the total abolition of vivisection will ever remain the object of the Society, "the Society is not thereby precluded from making efforts in Parliament for "lesser measures, having for their object the saving of animals from scientific "torture."
The Commissioners of Inland Revenue refused the Society's claim to exemption from Income Tax for the year 1942-43 in respect of its investment income under Section 37 (1) (b) of the Income Tax Act, 1918. On an application by the Society to the Special Commissioners under Section 19 of the Finance Act, 1925, the Special Commissioners, while finding that, on the evidence (which included that of a number of eminent medical and scientific witnesses), "on balance, the object of the Society, so far from "being for the public benefit, was gravely injurious thereto", considered that they were bound to hold, on the authority of In re Foveaux, Cross v. London Anti-Vivisection Society, [1895] 2 Ch. 501, and In re Wedgwood, Allen v. Wedgwood, [1915] 1 Ch. 113, that the Society was a body of persons established for charitable purposes only, its object of altering the law only coming in in a subsidiary way. They accordingly allowed the Society's claim.
Held, (Lord Porter dissenting), that the Society was not established for charitable purposes only, because:-
(a) the securing of an alteration of the law was a main, and not a subsidiary, object of the Society: such an object was political, and, therefore, not charitable; and
(b) in considering whether the objects of the Society were for the public benefit, the Court was not bound to take intention as decisive, but should determine, on the evidence before it, whether on balance the objects would in fact benefit the community.
Held, In re Foveaux, Cross v. London Anti-Vivisection Society, [1895] 2 Ch. 501, overruled.
Stated under the Finance Act, 1925, Section 19, and the Income Tax Act, 1918, Section 149, by the Commissioners for the Special Purposes of the Income Tax Acts for the opinion of the King's Bench Division of the High Court of Justice.
1. At a meeting of the Commissioners for the Special Purposes of the Income Tax Acts held on 8th, 9th and 10th December, 1943, the said Commissioners heard a claim by the National Anti-Vivisection Society (hereinafter called "the Society") to exemption from Income Tax on investment income aggregating £2,876 15s. 7d. for the year ended 5th April, 1943, on the ground that the Society was a body of persons established for charitable purposes only, and, as such, was entitled to exemption from tax by virtue of Section 37, Income Tax Act, 1918. The said claim had been refused by the Commissioners of Inland Revenue (hereinafter called "the Appellants") on the ground that, in their opinion, the Society was not such a body.
2. Evidence was tendered before us both on behalf of the Society and on behalf of the Appellants. This evidence was partly documentary and partly oral. The documentary evidence consists of the documents specified in the schedule of documents hereto annexed and therein numbered 1 to 62(1). These documents are not annexed to this Case, but the parts which appear to us to be material are quoted in this Case. The documents specified in part I of the said schedule are published by the Society. The journal "The Animals' Defender" (of which documents numbers 9 to 29 are copies) is edited by the director of the Society and issued monthly. It is described in the Society's annual reports (e.g. that for 1941-document number 8) as "The Organ of the Society".
3. The Society is a voluntary society governed by rules. As its name implies, its general purpose is that of opposition to "vivisection", an expression which (as will be seen) includes experiments of every kind upon living animals. But before setting out the constitution and objects of the Society in detail it may be convenient to indicate shortly the statutory and other back-ground upon which those objects rest, as given in evidence before us:-
(a) The events antecedent to, and contemporaneous with, the setting up of anti-vivisection societies in general are conveniently set out at pages 5 to 6 of Sir Leonard Rogers' book "The Truth about Vivisection" (document number 49), as follows:-
BRIEF HISTORY OF THE ROYAL COMMISSIONS ON VIVISECTION OF 1875 AND 1906. "The present inquiry is enormously simplified by the fact that two Royal "Commissions have reported unanimously on the subject after hearing "evidence on both sides. Stephen Paget, in his work on experiments on "animals, pointed out that the vivisection controversy originated in English "medical journals in 1858 to 1861, and that with one insignificant exception "the first anti-vivisection societies (henceforth called A.-V. societies) only "came into existence in 1875 to 1876, at the time of or after the appointment "of the Royal Commission of 1875. It was therefore largely at the instance "of the medical profession itself that the inquiry of 1875 was held, and "resulted in the passage of the Act of 1876 under which medical research "through animal experiments has ever since been regulated in a manner "approved by the medical profession, and under the control of the Home "Secretary.
"Owing to the continued agitation during the next thirty years of the "numerous, for the most part small, A.-V. societies, that sprang up after the "1875 Royal Commission had been appointed, some of which demanded
"immediate legal abolition of all animal experiments and others restriction "preparatory to eventual total prohibition, the second Royal Commission "on the subject was announced in the spring of 1906.(b) The Act referred to, which was passed as a result of the report of the first Royal Commission, is the Cruelty to Animals Act, 1876 (39 & 40 Vict., c. 77). Section 2 of that Act provides that a person shall not perform on a living animal any experiment calculated to give pain, except subject to the restrictions imposed by the Act.
(c) These restrictions, however, are subject to certain qualifications which include provisions empowering experiments to be performed without anaesthetics upon a certificate of the Secretary of State that insensibility cannot be produced without necessarily frustrating the object of the experiments. By Section 8 the Secretary of State is empowered to grant licences subject to any conditions which he may think expedient for the better carrying into effect the objects of the Act but not inconsistent with the provisions thereof. By Section 9 the Secretary of State may require reports of experiments, and by Section 10 he shall cause all registered places to be visited by inspectors.
(d) The Secretary of State presents annually to the House of Commons a return of licences granted by him to perform experiments on living animals. Documents numbers 52 and 53 are copies of these returns for the years 1937 and 1938 respectively. Documents numbers 54 to 61 are forms relating to licences.
(e) The purport of the various certificates issued by the Secretary of State, and the respective circumstances in which the same are required, are set out on page 2 of the Secretary of State's returns for 1937 and 1938 (documents 52 and 53). The general conditions laid down in practice by the Secretary of State with regard to the giving of certificates dispensing with anaesthetics are set out at pages 3 to 5 of the said annual returns.
(f) On page 4 of the return for 1938 appears the following statement:-
The experiments performed without anaesthetics, 908,846 in number, "were mostly inoculations and feeding experiments. In addition a "certain number consisted of oral administrations, inhalations, external "applications and the abstraction of body fluids. In no instance has a "certificate dispensing with the use of anaesthetics been allowed for an "experiment involving a serious operation.
"It will be seen that the operative procedures in experiments "performed under Certificate A., without anaesthetics, are only such as "are attended by no considerable, if appreciable, pain.
(g) The Secretary of State has appointed an advisory committee to assist him with advice in the administration of the Act. The names of the members of the committee in 1937 and 1938 are set out at page 6 of the said annual return of those respective years. The chairman of the committee was, in 1937, the Rt. Hon. Lord Atkin, and, in 1938, the Rt. Hon. Lord Justice du Parcq. The other members of the committee in each of these years were six eminent medical men.
(h) The second Royal Commission was appointed in 1906 and issued its final report in 1912. Document number 62 is a print of that report. The main conclusions of the Commission are set out at pages 47 and 57. Shortly stated, the Commission expressed the conclusions that-
(i) notwithstanding certain failures, valuable knowledge had been acquired in regard to physiological processes and the causation of disease, and that useful methods for the prevention, cure and treatment of certain diseases had resulted from experimental investigations upon living animals, and that it was highly improbable that without such...
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