Opinion ID: 411167
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Unique Character of Activities

Text: 57 In order for the activities of a business league to be substantially related to its exempt function, those activities must be unique to the organization's tax-exempt purpose. It is the distinctiveness of the activity that cements the substantial relationship between the two. Such services as educational and training programs, legislative lobbying, and institutional advertising clearly satisfy this uniqueness test, because they advance the purposes of the business league as an entity in itself. It is the institutional ends that must be served if the activity is to be deemed substantially related. Educational, legislative, and advertising services are peculiarly suitable activities for a business league because they further the common business interest that unites the association's members. See Treas.Reg. Sec. 1.501(c)(6)-1. In the case at bar, the publication and maintenance by the League of a looseleaf library service compiling all the statutes, regulations, and other legal materials pertinent to the operation of a credit union would exemplify the sort of service unique to the League's tax-exempt function. Such a service, provided to League members for a subscription fee, would bear a unique relationship to the League's purpose of promoting the development of credit unions in Louisiana. Presumably alternative access to such a service would be limited, and its narrow scope would make it singularly useful to member credit unions. Any business league activity so distinctively oriented toward its members seemingly would bear a substantial relationship to its purpose.