Case Name: In the Matter of the Will of John Guy Vassar, Deceased
Court: New York Supreme Court, General Term
Jurisdiction: New York
Decision Date: 1890-12-08
Citations: 34 N.Y. St. Rep. 328
Docket Number: 
Parties: In the Matter of the Will of John Guy Vassar, Deceased.
Judges: 
Reporter: New York State Reporter
Volume: 34
Pages: 328–330

Head Matter:
In the Matter of the Will of John Guy Vassar, Deceased.
(Supreme Court, General Term, Second Department,
Filed December 8, 1890.)
1. Collateral inheritance tax—Exemptions.
To entitle societies, corporations and institutions to exemption from the collateral inheritance tax, they must be entirely free from general taxation. Partial relief from taxation is insufficient.
3. Same.
Vassar College, The Vassar Brothers’ Hospital and The Vassar Brothers’ Home for Aged Men are not entirely exempt from taxation, and legacies to them are subject to the operation of the statute.
(Barnard, P. J., dissents.)
Appeal from portions of an order of the surrogate of Dutchess, county assessing a tax upon certain legacies.
G. Swan and B. F. Taylor, for app’lt, Yassar- College; Allison Butts, for app’lt, Yassar Brothers’ Hospital; John P. H. Tollman, for app’lt, Yassar Brothers’ Home for Aged Men; Robert F. Wilkinson, for resp’ts.

Opinion:
Dykman, J.
This is an appeal from a portion of the order of the surrogate of Dutchess county assessing a tax upon the legacies bequeathed to Yassar College, Yassar Brothers' Hospital and the Yassar Brothers' Home for Aged Men by the last will and testament of John Guy Yassar, deceased.
The legacy under the same will to the John Guy Yassar Orphan Asylum was exempted from taxation by the surrogate, and there is no appeal from that portion of the order.
All property which now passes by will, or by the intestate laws of this state, from any person who died seized or possessed of the same while a resident of this state to any person, or persons, or to any body politic or corporate, other than to or for the use of the societies, corporations and institutions now exempted by law from taxation, is subject to a tax of five dollars on every hundred dollars of the value of such property. Such are the provisions of section 1 of chap. 713 of the Laws of 1887, amending chap. 483 of the Laws of 1885.
The statute under consideration is new, but so far as it has received judicial construction the tendency has been to hold that the societies, corporations and institutions exempted from the operation of the act to tax gifts, legacies and collateral inheritances are those bodies only which enjoy complete immunity from taxation as to all their property.
There must be an entire freedom from general taxation to entitle such institutions to exemption from taxation under this statute, and as none of the appellants are entirely exempt, it follows that they are not within the exception to the general operation of the act. Partial relief from taxation is insufficient
Our conclusion is that the legacies are subject to the operation of the statute, and the order appealed from should be affirmed, with costs to be paid from the estate to the respondents.
Pratt, J., concurs.