People ex rel. Huck v. Graceland Cemetery Co.

Citations

• 86 Ill. 336

Syllabus

<p>1. Taxation—exemption. The true spirit of our laws requires that all property should bear its just proportion of the burden of taxation, and when an exception is made in favor of a corporation, justice demands that it should show clearly a compliance with the terms and spirit of the act exempting it from taxation before it can be permitted to escape a duty incumbent equally upon every citizen.</p> <p>2. The charter of a cemetery company provided that all property held and! actually used by the corporation for burial purposes, or for the general uses of lot holders, or subservient to burial uses, and which had been platted and recorded a? cemetery grounds, should be exempt from taxation. The company had ground in actual use for cemetery purposes, and other lands separated therefrom by a public highway, which were platted and recorded as cemetery lands, but never used as such. The company had erected thereon a stable and some houses, occupied and used by men in the employ of the company, and removed mold and sand therefrom, and used it as needed in improving the ground actually used for cemetery purposes: Held, that such use of the property did not render it exempt from taxation under the terms and spirit of the charter.</p>