tion of Dalton's Justice was published a year or two Queen's Bench in the first case," are occupied for the after that date, and that the author, in that edition, purposes of a highly laudable charity, but one of a says, that the overseers are to raise the rate by taxing strictly private nature." The same distinction was the occupiers-" proportioning them to an annual be- taken by the Court of Queen's Bench in other cases, nefit." I have not had access to the earlier editions particularly Reg. v. The Licensed Victuallers Society (1 of this work, but certainly those words are repeated B. & S. 71) and Reg. v. The Baptist Missionary Society in the fifth edition, published in 1635. It seems, (10 Q. B. 884). On the same ground of dedication to therefore, plain, from the object of the act, from its public purposes, reposes also the exemption of churches words, and from the earliest exposition, that the and other places of religious worship. Even before occupier must, in order to be rateable, enjoy a bene- the recent statute, churches and chapels were exempt ficial occupation. It is not essential that this occu- from rates, if no profit to individuals was actually pation should be for the individual benefit of the oc- made by letting the pews (Rex v. Woodward, 5 T. cupier himself-it may be for the benefit of another R. 79; Rex v. Agar and Others, 14 East, 256); » -it may be for the benefit of a plurality of other per- that it is a mistake to suppose that the exemption of sons, of a considerable number of other persons, or churches and chapels depends merely on the stat. 3 & even of a number not certainly defined, but limited by 4 Will. 4, c. 30. That statute, which applies to church locality or other circumstances-yet I conceive, that rates as well as poor rates, extended the then existing if the property be occupied for the benefit, not of a exemption, by exempting from rates all places dedinumber of individuals, more or less defined, but for cated exclusively to public religious worship, even the benefit of the public at large, then it is not rate- when the pews are let, and profit is thus made of the able. This conclusion seems to me to be the result of building. In Rex v. The Mayor of London (ubi sup.). a long series of authorities. I do not rely on the where the question arose, whether certain trustees of exemption of the Crown; for that exemption would a barge-way and toll-gate should be rated, Mr. Justice take place on the principle that the Crown is not Grove says, that," to exempt themselves from the rate, bound by an act of Parliament, unless named therein. the trustees should have shewn that they were trus But even this exemption is merely personal; for te- tees for the public." In Rex v. The Commissioners of nants of the Crown, occupying for their private benefit, Salter's Load Sluice (ubi sup.), the property was held are rateable. Whether occupiers for the service of not rateable, because all the money collected must be the general government are exempt on the ground expended for what Lord Kenyon calls the public purthat they represent the Crown, may be doubtful. It poses of the act. The history of the property now should rather seem that they are exempt because they under your Lordships' consideration in many ways occupy for public purposes. Thus, the Birmingham confirms the position, that property occupied for public Post-office was held not rateable, Lord Campbell purposes is not rateable. In the year 1806, an attreating it as clear, but expressing regret "that pro- tempt was made to rate the Liverpool Docks The perty taken for public purposes is not rateable." sessions quashed the rate, and the Court of King's (Smith v. The Guardians of Birmingham, ubi sup.) Bench (whether by consent or otherwise does not Upon the same ground, an occupation by the Horse appear) affirmed the order of sessions. The atGuards (Amherst v. Somers, ubi sup.) was held not tempt, however, was repeated about twenty years rateable, but that the possessions of the public were after, in 1827, and the case was then fully argued. not rateable, and that in the case then before them the| The statutes were brought before the Court; those plaintiff was exempt, because "he was like a trustee statutes directing then as now, that certain burthens for the public, deriving no benefit for himself." The should be discharged, and after their discharge the exemption is not confined to premises occupied for rates should be lowered. The Court of King's Bench the purposes of the general government; it extends to held that there was no beneficial occupation in any occupations for the purposes of local government also. person, and confirmed the order of sessions, striking Thus, buildings occupied by the local police, "held," out the assessment. (Rex v. The Inhabitants of Liver says the Court, "for public purposes:" (The Justices pool (ubi sup.) At the same time Rex v. The Trustees of Lancashire v. Stretford, ubi sup.); a shire hall (Hodg-of the Weaver Navigation (ubi sup.) was argued and deson v. The Local Board of Carlisle, ubi sup.); a county gaol (Reg. v. Shepherd, ubi sup.); reformatory schools supported by voluntary subscriptions, open to several counties, and within the 17 & 18 Vict. c. 86 (Shepherd v. Bradford, ubi sup.), are all exempt from poor rates. The exemption extends to trusts for charities for the benefit of the public at large, though entirely unconnected with the Government. Public hospitals are exempt. St. Luke's Hospital was held not rateable, on the ground that there was no beneficial occupation (Rex v. St. Luke's Hospital, ubi sup.); so was St. Bartholomew's Hospital. conceive that the exemption of hospitals and other charities stands on the ground not that they are charities, but that they are public charities, and that there is no beneficial occupier except the public; and so the Court of Queen's Bench held when they decided that Bethlehem was not rateable; so also they held in a recent case, Reg. v. Stapleton (33 L. J., M. Č., 17), and the Court of Common Pleas, in the case of Shepherd v. Bradford (C. P., Easter Term, 1864). Both Courts, in these two cases, draw a distinction between private and public charities, holding the first rateable and the The premises," say the Court of last not rateable. * Reg. v. St. George's, Southwark (10 Q. B. 852). I cided in the same manner. "The surplus tolls of the 23 , to public purposes is not rateable. The only question | And if your Lordships have to choose between these was, whether the benefit of the inhabitants of a parti- authorities, I have already called your Lordships' atcular borough, they being but a section of the public, tention to the fact, that Reg. v. The Mayor of Liverwas a public or a private purpose; and in both cases it pool and Reg. v. The Inhabitants of Exminster are recogwas held, that the property of a municipal corporation nised by the Legislature as law, and are continued in was property dedicated to public purposes, and not some cases as the then existing law, up to this moment, rateable. These decisions caused stat. 4 & 5 Vict. by the authority of the statute. The decision in The c. 48, to be passed, the language of which is not only Governors of the Bristol Poor v. Waite was followed, as very strong to shew that the Legislature itself consi- to the Taunton market, in Reg. v. Badcock (ubi sup.); dered that property dedicated to public purposes was, as to the Huddersfield Waterworks, in Reg. v. The and is, not rateable, but seems to me to create a sta- Churchwardens of Longwood (ubi sup.); and as to the tutable bar to holding, that even property owned and Harrowgate Waterworks, in Reg. v. The Commissioners occupied by municipal corporations, is rateable in cases of Harrowgate (15 Q. B. 1012). These cases are all beyond the scope of the enacting clause. I forbear to subject to the same observations as the case of The comment minutely on the language of the statute, Bristol Poor v. Waite. The question was, whether the because of the length to which the observations would occupation was for the public at large, or for the parextend; but almost every line is deserving the atten- tial benefit of a section of the public. (See the obtive consideration of your Lordships. Two observa-servations of the Court of Queen's Bench in Reg. v. tions, however, I must be pardoned for making-first, St. George, Southwark, 10 Q. B. 852). The decision in the statute is not a declaratory, but an enacting statute; The Overseers of Birkenhead v. The Trustees of Birkensecondly, so far from reflecting on the correctness of head Dock (ubi sup.) is really no authority on this the then recent decisions, it adopts and affirms them point, because it proceeded entirely on the ground, in certain cases at the end of the proviso to the 1st that there did not then appear to be, as now there is, a section. The statute there continues the exemption statutable obligation to reduce the tolls when their from poor rate in cases where the area of the borough, produce should exceed the expenses. It is quite true, and the area covered by a single poor rate, are co- however, that the Court, or at least the Lord Chief extensive, because, in such a case, there is no reason Justice, did indicate a wish to depart from the aufor interfering with the existing law. To put the case thorities as to the rateability of property dedicated in the clearest light, suppose, what has actually hap- to public purposes. That case was followed by The pened in some boroughs, and may be the case in Tyne Commissioners v. The Overseers of Chirton_(ubi many, that the value of the corporate property ren- sup.), which was decided by Lord Campbell and Mr. ders a borough rate unnecessary; and suppose that Justice Crompton, on the ground that the parties bethere is an entire poor rate for the borough, which is nefited were only a particular section of the public, also not an uncommon case, either because the borough viz. those who used the docks. But Mr. Justice Wightincludes but a single parish, or because the manage- man seems to rest his judgment on the ground, that ment of the poor in the borough is consolidated by a it did not appear that there could not be a surplus single act; in such a case, I conceive that the muni- revenue; and Mr. Justice Hill, though he assents to cipal property is still, by the express words of the the conclusion, does not give his reasons, which, for statute, not only exempt, but exempt not because the anything that appears, may have been the same as statute so enacts, but because it had been exempted those which influenced Mr. Justice Wightman. I canby law before the act passed, and the exemption is not help thinking that these recent authorities, when recognised and continued. the precise point decided in each case, and the ground on which the judgment proceeds, are carefully examined, will be found as authorities not to be at variance with the position, that an occupation, clearly and entirely for the benefit of the whole public, is not rateable. But whatever weight may be attributable to some of them, or more properly to the expressions of some of the judges, it seems to me very slight compared with the weight which ought to be attributed to the antiquity, number, and consistency of the authorities, which shew that overseers cannot usurp the authority of Parliament in taxing the general public. The language, therefore, of the 43 Eliz., the whole current of the authorities there cited to your Lordships, and many others, with which I refrain from fatiguing your Lordships, as well as the language of the recent statute, 4 & 5 Vict. c. 48, seem to me to shew that land occupied for public purposes is not rateable. On the other side, great reliance was placed by the appellants on the case of The Governors of the Bristol Poor v. Waite (ubi sup.) But that case seems to me reconcilable with the position, that where the general public are the occupiers, the property is not rateable; for in that case only a section of the public were the occupiers-that is to say, the representatives of the poor of a particular district. Indeed, this distinction between the former cases and the case of The Governors of the Bristol Poor v. Waite is drawn by the Court of Queen's Bench itself in Reg. v. The Wallingford Union (ubi sup.) To what extent the property rated is occupied for the public at large is, and always must be, a question of degree, where it is extremely difficult to draw the line, and where it is likely there will be conflicting decisions. The conflict of the case of The Governors of the Bristol Poor v. Waite, if any, is with Reg. v. The Mayor of Liverpool (ubi sup.) and Reg. v. The Inhabitants of Exminster, where borough property was held not rateable. But even with respect to this apparent conflict, it may be observed, that the occupation was, in Reg. v. The Mayor of Liverpool, for the benefit of all the inhabitants of a district; and in the case of The Governors of the Bristol Poor v. Waite it was only for a portion of the inhabitants-that is to say, for the poor of the district. It is Then comes the next inquiry. Is the property now under consideration occupied for the benefit of the public at large? Primâ facie it should seem that it is so, for not only have all the Queen's subjects a right to use the docks at their free will and pleasure, paying their fair contribution to the expenses, and nothing more, but all persons whatsoever from what quarter of the globe soever they may come. objected, first, that the use of the docks is not for all the public, but only for a section of the public-that is to say, for as many of them as have invested their capital in ships, or barges, or boats. It might also be said, that a navigable river cannot be a public highway, because it is only for those who have invested their capital in ships, or barges, or boats; or that a public turnpike road, or, indeed, any public highway, is not a public carriageway or bridleway, it is only for those who possess or use carriages or horses. It is objected further by the appellants, that the incumbrances of the docks have the effect of making them rateable. It is contended (as interest and a portion of the principal of the debt is annually paid to the bondholders out of the produce of the tolls), that, to this extent at least, there is a beneficial occupation by the board in trust for the bondholders; because it is said that if a tenant from year to year occupied the property and received the tolls, without paying the instalments of the principal and the periodical interest of the debt, he would be willing to pay a rent, and that this theoretical rent is the criterion and measure of the rateable value of the occupation. But I conceive that no tenant could be supposed to receive the tolls without paying the charges. The tolls are appropriated to the payment of the expenses, including charges of construction and repair, and never can by law exceed that limit. As soon as the tolls do exceed it, they are by law to be reduced. If the amount now paid every year to the bondholders had been actually incurred for construction and repair in that year, it is plain there could be no rent. But the payment made in each year is still but the cost of construction and repair proportioned to that year, and spread over several years and averaged. If the fact that the expenses have not been incurred within the year warranted a distinction, then a bricklayer's or mason's bill, not paid within the year, but charged on the next or following years, would make the land in those years rateable. It can make no difference that the creditor is not the bricklayer or mason himself, but the assignee of the debt due to the bricklayer or mason. It is quite true that when land is let to a tenant, the value of the occupation to the occupier is alone considered in estimating its rateable value, and charges on the reversion are not regarded, | and are not deducted. But the payments made out of the tolls and discharge of debts and interest, in the case now before your Lordships, are not charges on a supposed reversion; they represent what are in ordinary cases expenses annually incurred. They are like tithes or tithes commutation rents-charge, which must be paid by the occupier to prevent the titheowner from entering; or, like contributions to a sea-wall, to prevent the land from being overflowed; or, like the annual or periodical expenses for repairs, all which are to be deducted in estimating the annual letting and rateable value of property (see the 6 & 7 Will. 4, c. 96, and the 25 & 26 Vict. c. 103). It may, indeed, be said that the expenses incurred in permanently improving land, e. g. in building a house on the land, are additions, not deductions, from the rateable value, though the average annual repairs of that house, when built, are so. But when a private house is built, the disposable annual income derived from the land is increased, and therefore the rateable value of the land is augmented. But in the case before your Lordships the disposable annual income from the docks is not, and never can be, augmented, for tolls always must be reduced to such a point as to have no disposable income. The objection of the appellants, that these charges are to be treated like mortgages, or charges on the reversion of ordinary property, and not to be regarded in estimating rateable value, seems inconsistent with itself, for the argument rather seems to shew that they are to be regarded, not, indeed, as a deduction, but as causing an addition to the value, and that the docks, when incumbered with debt, are rateable, and when free from incumbrance are not rateable. Again: if these docks are rateable on the ground of the debt and interest owing by them, and secured upon them, then it will follow that, in the case of turnpike roads, which are involved in debt (at least in those cases where the soil is in the commissioners, as sometimes happens), the road will be rateable to the poor, because, being involved in debt, the bondholders receive interest. It is objected, lastly, by the appellant, that there is no substantial distinction between docks made by a joint-stock company, and the docks now under consideration. But if there be no legislative limit imposed on the tolls, or on the profits of the joint-stock enterprise, then the two cases are widely and obviously different. For in case of a joint-stock company, the land used for the undertaking may produce profit to the company, and on that ground would be clearly rateable. And even if the limits of profit be fixed by the Legislature by imposing a maximum of tolls, still in the case of i commercial joint-stock company, whatever margin of profit is left to the shareholders over and above the ordinary rate of interest on floating capital, confers a rateable value on the land. On this principle, and to this extent, it is that a railway, or any other joint-stock company, is rateable in respect of its occupation of land. You take the gross income and deduct the expenses, including in the deductions, not only interest on the floating capital, but even tenants' profits thereon, and what is left, after these deductions, is profit to the shareholders, and that profit constitutes the rateable value of the railway. No one ever heard of augmenting the rateable value of the railway or other property by the sum payable as principal or interest on its debentures. What the shareholders receive for their profit, derived from the occupation of the lands, forms the theoretical rent, and therefore the rateable value of the land, not what the creditors receive for their debts or interest. In the Liverpool Docks there are no shareholders, and no profit can ever be received by any one; all that can be done is to keep down interest and pay the debts, neither of which payments consti tutes profit to any one. Whatever proportion of the tolls is not wanted for this purpose must, as already observed, be immediately taken off. However, in a case of this nature, probably authority rather than general reasoning ought to decide the ques tion. I do not understand your Lordships to ask, and therefore it would be officious and presumptuous to ex press, any opinion on the effect of the precedents cited in binding your Lordships as the supreme tribunal. Bat I conceive that a judge sitting either in one of the superior courts of law, or even in the Exchequer Chanber, would consider himself concluded by authority in answering your Lordships' first question. And for confirmation, I venture to refer your Lordships to Mr. Justice Crompton's language as to the effect of the decisions in pronouncing his judgment in the Court of Exchequer. He says, "With regard to the former decisions, I think that neither a court of co-ordinate jurisdiction, nor a court of error, ought to interfere such a case;" and, independently of the respect due by our system of law to precedent, a judge would have to consider some of the consequences which must follow from adopting at this late period a new coustruction of the statute of Elizabeth. If a dedication to public purposes be consistent with rateability, then, for the future, public hospitals, like St. Bartholomew Hospital, St. George's Hospital, the London Hospital, St. Thomas's Hospital, and other establishments of the like nature in the metropolis and throughout the kingdom, with a multitude of other public charities, become at once subject to poor rates. Lunatic asylums, like St. Luke's or Bethlehem, in the metropolis, and county lunatic asylums, also become assessable at their letting value; though in many instances the exemption of such institutions is recognised by acts f Parliament, providing that land taken for the pr pose shall retain its rateability to the extent of the value of the land without the buildings upon it. Churches and chapels (but for the recent statute) would, even where the pews are not let, have become rateable. Property is to be rated, not at what a tê 30 ant does give, but at what he would give for it | its actual condition (6 & 7 Will. 4, c. 96); coungaols, county reformatories, county courts, and urts of justice, not only in counties and cities, it in the metropolis also (not indeed in Westminer Hall, because that is one of the Queen's palaces), ay become rateable. The property of the Crown the occupation of the Crown, will, no doubt, ill be protected from rateability; but old questions ow at rest will reappear as to other buildings occued for public purposes, like the Horse Guards, the dmiralty, many buildings and residences at Portsouth, Plymouth, Chatham, Milford Haven, and reenwich, the British Museum, the National Gallery, reenwich Hospital, the Custom House, the General ost-office, burial grounds, many of the apartments Somerset House, the premises occupied by the Poorw Commissioners and other public bodies, public idges, public turnpike roads, and the soil of many vigable rivers, if not of public highways themselves. many of these instances money has been expended d money borrowed on the faith of precedent, the w having been considered as settled by its authorised pounders, for so many years. In the case now bere your Lordships, as pointed out by Mr. Justice ll in the Court of Exchequer Chamber, new docks ve been constructed, and large sums of money borwed, on the faith of the decisions in this and other ses. If the fact that the indebtedness of the board, d the application of their revenues to the payment principal and interest, makes them liable to be ted, then, as I have already said, I think the prinles on which the railways and other joint-stock enprises throughout the kingdom have hitherto been ted, will be unsettled. In answer to your Lordships' second question, if at time of the passing of the acts enumerated in the jestion, it had been clear, on authority and principle, at the Liverpool Docks were rateable, then, I think, @words contained in the sections referred to would thave exempted them from rateability. But that almost an impossible supposition, for, had that been such enactments could never have found their way to a succession of statutes. I conceive that these actments are to be read, like every other written strument, with reference to the existing and surunding facts. Those facts are, that from the time the first establishment of the docks, in the reign of leen Anne, they had never been rated, except on two casions, on both of which occasions they had been onounced exempt from rates by the Court of Queen's nch. Those two decisions had been acquiesced in, d acted on, for fifty years since the first, and thirty ars since the last, decision. No one can doubt, I ink, that the successive penmen who drew the acts, d all the parties to them-the board, the corporaon, and the several parishes-took it to be clear, st, that an occupation, not beneficial, was not ratele; and, secondly, that the docks (as distinguished om the warehouses) were not rateable on that ound. The opinion of the draughtsmen of itself es for little or nothing; but that opinion (in the resence of parties interested to dispute it) passed achallenged five times through both Houses of Parament. I think that circumstance amounts to a reognition by Parliament of the law, that a beneficial ccupation is necessary to rateability, and that the ccupation of these docks by the Mersey Board is not eneficial. It will, moreover, be observed, that these cts are not mere private acts, but public acts, and not nerely public in a technical sense, but upon a matter affecting the general public. I think, further, that the enactments disclose evidence of a bargain, for which was needed and obtained the sanction of Parliament, No. 560, VOL. XI., NEW SERIES. between, first, the lenders of money; secondly, the board and their predecessors in estate; thirdly, the parochial authorities of Liverpool; and, fourthly, the general public; the effect of which bargain is, that a certain portion of the property is to be rateable, and the residue not rateable. And that opinion seems to have been entertained by the Court of Exchequer Chamber. I may add, in conclusion, that the Court of Queen's Bench twice, and the last time, after argument, before four of the most eminent judges who ever presided in that court, had held these docks not rateable, and at this moment there stood the unanimous decisions of the Court of Queen's Bench in 1827, the unanimous decision of the Court of Common Pleas in 1862, and the unanimous decision of the Court of Exchequer Chamber, in error from the Common Pleas, to the same effect. In answer to your Lordships' third question, I am of opinion that the act 20 & 21 Vict. c. 162, ss. 26, 27, does not impose on the board any liability to poor rates, which but for those clauses would not exist. The words would seem primâ facie to regard charges or liabilities upon the land, such as debts, and perhaps easements. It was stated at your Lordships' bar that there are from twenty to twenty-four charges on the land properly so called, and independent of poor rates, to which the words in that sense would be applicable. But the poor rate, which, as I have already reminded your Lordships, originally affected personal property in the same way as real property, has repeatedly been held to be no charge on the land at all, but only on the person who occupies in respect of the profits of his occupation. (Case v. Stevens, Fitzg. 297; Earl of Bute v. Grindall, 2 H. Bl. 265; Rowls v. Gells, Cowp. 451). Moreover, the poor rate is a personal charge which exists, or does not exist, according to the character of the occupier, as he is or is not a person liable to be rated. Suppose these general words in a grant to the Crown, or in a deed conveying land to trustees of a court of justice, or of a church, it is plain that they would not impose on the grantee a liability to poor rate if he were exempt from rates. Or suppose them to exist in a statutable conveyance to the Crown, to which the Crown is a party, thus, e. g. for fortifications, or in a statutable conveyance to any other clearly-exempted occupier, I conceive that the words would not impose poor rates on occupiers not otherwise liable to pay. Again: the act of the following year, 21 & 22 Vict. c. 90, s. 3, while incorporating the general Lands Clauses Act, excepts sect. 133 of that general act, which excepted section provides for the preservation of the liability to poor rates, and land tax in certain cases. But sect. 5 of the local act preserves the land tax, but is silent as to the poor rate, shewing, as I conceive, that the Legislature intended to preserve the land tax, but not the poor rate. Lastly, the act 20 & 21 Vict. is an act for consolidating the docks at Liverpool and Birkenhead into one estate, and vesting the control of them in one public trust; and it would be singular if one portion of the property should be rateable and one not rateable under precisely similar circumstances; and this observation is strengthened by remembering that where such a distinction exists (as in the case of the warehouses) it is created by express words. LORD CHANCELLOR.-The question raised on these appeals depends in a great measure on the inquiry, what is the occupation of real property which is liable to be rated under the 43 Eliz. c. 2, s. 1? Independently of the decided cases, several of which are irreconcilable with each other, it would seem to be easy to answer this inquiry; and, having regard to the Parochial Assessment Act (6 & 7 Will. 4, c. 96), it may be said in answer, that "occupation, to be rateable, must 11 bare trustees, and held for a public purpose only, were such occupiers of property as to be liable to be rated to the poor. This case in its turn has been followed in other decisions as an authority, and it might have been supposed that the authority of The Salter's Load Sluice case, and its two satellites, Rex v. Liverpool and Rex v. The Trustees of the Weaver Navigation, had come to an end. But, in the year 1839, the Court of Queen's Bench, in the case of Reg. v. The Corporation of Liverpool (ubi sup.), returned to its old allegiance, and again set up the authority of Rex v. Liverpool ad Rex v. The Weaver Navigation. This last case of g v. The Corporation of Liverpool was decided upon the principle, that since the Municipal Corporation Ast the property of a municipal corporation is held upon trust for the purposes of the borough fund, and therefore that the corporation of Liverpool were bare trustees of the property in question for public pur poses. The mischief of this decision was remedied by the stat. 4 & 5 Vict. c. 48. But, unfortunately, that act did not declare the law. Some subsequent decisions of the Court of Queen's Bench have been marked with much timidity. They have, in effect, departed from the grounds in the decision in The Salter's Load Sluice case and its attendant cases; but have, at the same time, attempted, by very questionable distinctions, to save whole the authority of those cases Thus, in the cases of Reg. v. Badcock (ubi sup.) and Reg. v. Longwood (ubi sup.) there is an attempt to distinguish between the interest of the public unlimited and the interest of the public limited by the bounds of a county borough or parish. At last, in the case of The Tyne Improvement Commissioners v. Chirton (ubi sap). the Court of Queen's Bench recurred to that which is, in my opinion, the true principle, namely, that the only ground of exemption from the statute of Elizabeth is that which is furnished by the rule, that the Sovereign is not bound by that statute, and that, consequently, when valuable property (that is, property capable of yielding a net rent above what is required for it maintenance) is sought to be exempted, on the ground that it is occupied by bare trustees for public pur poses, the purposes must be such as are required and created by the Government of the country, and are therefore, to be deemed part of the use and service of the Crown. be of property yielding, or capable of yielding, a net annual value-that is to say, a clear rent over and above the probable average annual cost of the repairs, insurance, and other expenses, if any, necessary to maintain the property in a state to command such rent." It is in this sense I understand the words "beneficial occupation," whenever it is said, that to support a rate the occupation must be a beneficial one; for, on principle, it is by no means necessary that the occupation should be beneficial to the occupier. It is sufficient if the property be capable of yielding a | clear rent over and above the necessary outgoings. The only occupier exempt from the operation of the act is the King, because he is not named in the statute. And the direct and immediate servants of the Crown, whose occupation is the occupation of the Crown itself, also come within the exemption. But this ground of exemption does not warrant many decisions which have held that property used for public purposes is not rateable. So also trustees who are in law the tenants or occupiers of valuable property, upon trust for charitable purposes, such as hospitals or lunatic asylums, are, in principle, rateable, notwithstanding that the buildings are actually occupied by paupers who are sick or insane. If the matter were res integra, I could not concur in the decision of Lord Mansfield, in the case of St. Luke's Hospital (ubi sup.), in which he is reported to have said that mere trustees cannot be esteemed occupiers or rated as lessees; or with his conclusion in the case of Rex v. St. Bartholomew's Hospital (ubi sup.) But, with a slight verbal alteration, Í entirely agree with the remark of the learned judges in the present case, that if Lord Mansfield meant that the persons in the legal occupation of a valuable property, are not rateable, if they occupy it in a merely fiduciary character, it is a position which cannot be maintained. To these observations and decisions of Lord Mansfield, that which appears to me to be the erroneous doctrine of several subsequent decisions, is to be attributed. This is plain on an examination of Lord Kenyon's judgment in the subsequent case of Rex v. The Commissioners of Salter's Load Sluice (ubi sup.) Lord Kenyon refers to the decision in the case of St. Luke's Hospital, and adopts the position that trustees who have a bare naked trust, not coupled with any interest, are not liable to be rated, and he uses language which, with the decisions of Lord Mans- If this be the true criterion of exemption from field, has introduced the notion that if valuable pro- rateability where the property is valuable, it is clear perty be in the possession of trustees, who are bound that the Mersey Docks are liable to be rated. In th to apply the whole of the proceeds to public, but not country many works tending greatly to the conve government, purposes, that is, in works or purposes nience and benefit of the public, and in that setse for the better accommodation or use of the public, public works, are the result and creation of priva they are not liable to be rated. There is nothing in enterprise, being made or performed by money the act of Elizabeth, or in the reason of the thing, to scribed by the public on the terms or in the hope of warrant this conclusion-no exemption is thereby receiving such interest out of the proceeds of th given to charity or to public purposes, beyond that works as will, in the judgment of the subscribers, make which is strictly involved in the position that the the investment a profitable one. Such is the conditi Crown is not bound by the act-and it is a remark of the Mersey Docks, which are, in truth, prope able fact that, wherever these opinions of Lord Mans-used and occupied for the profit and benefit of a num field and Lord Kenyon have not been presented to the ber of persons; and it is the same thing in substane Court of King's Bench, the judges have adopted the as if the docks had been demised by the subscribers to correct view of the statute. Thus, in Rex v. Liverpool (ubi sup.), decided in the year 1823, and Rex v. The Trustees of the Weaver Navigation (ubi sup.), decided in 1827, Salter's Load Sluice case was recited and relied on; and the Court of Queen's Bench adopted the language of Lord Kenyon, and followed his decision. But in the case of The Governor of the Bristol Poor v. Waite (ubi sup.), decided in 1836, The Salter's Load Sluice case does not appear to have been referred to, and the Court recurred to the correct view of the statute of Elizabeth, and held that the governor of the Bristol poor, who had some building and land on lease for the occupation of their poor, although they were sab the trustees on the terms of maintaining the docks and paying the subscribers a rent equivalent to the interest on their bonds. I am, therefore, clearly of the same opinion with the majority of the learn judges, that the Mersey Docks and Harbour Bos are occupiers of the docks and harbour, within the true meaning of the word "occupier" in the act * Elizabeth. The answer to the second question put to the learned judges is, in effect, a mere consequence the answer to the first question; for it cannot be p tended that the statute of Elizabeth has been repealed either expressly or impliedly, by any of the statutes |