E. Coast Conf. of the Evangelical Covenant Church of America v. Town of Swanzey, 146 N.H. 658, 663, 786 A.2d 88 (2001) (quotations omitted; emphasis added). Assembly points to our holding in St. Paul's Church v. Concord, 75 N.H. 420, 75 A. 531 (1910), to support its argument that a “house of public worship” is, by definition, exempt from taxation in its entirety. When we issued our opinion in St. Paul's Church, the religious exemption statute provided: “Real estate ... is liable to be taxed, except houses of public worship.”
Neither of the briefs cites any case construing the secular use of premises which are regularly used for religious services, but our research discloses that this is not a wholly novel problem. In St. Paul's Church v. City of Concord, 1910, 75 N.H. 420, 75 A. 531, 27 L.R.A., N.S., 910, the court had before it a petition for abatement of real property taxes. The New Hampshire statutes, Pub.St. 1901, c. 55, § 2, provided that "Real estate * * * is liable to be taxed, except houses of public worship."
Although owned by the association, this land is occupied and used principally by the cottage owners for their own private and secular purposes and not for the statutory exempted religious purposes of the association. RSA 72:23 III; St. Paul's Church v. Concord, 75 N.H. 420, 426; Appalachian Mountain Club v. Meredith, 103 N.H. 5, 12. "The use of land for hunting, hiking and fishing is not the type of activity related to religious activities which the Legislature sought to exempt from taxation." Franciscan Fathers v. Pittsfield, 97 N.H. 396, 401.
Such a method was considered proper and not impractical in Young Men's Christian Ass'n. v. Keene, 70 N.H. 223, and in Hedding c. Ass'n v. Epping, 88 N.H. 321. The view seemingly taken in St. Paul's Church v. Concord, 75 N.H. 420, 424, that a division in use of a building by which one part is used for school purposes and the rest of it for other purposes bars it from partial exemption, is not thought to accord with the authority of the cases cited in support of the view (Trustees of Phillips Exeter Academy v. Exeter, supra, and New London v. Colby Academy, supra) or with the intent of the statute. It is fairly conceivable that an academy building might be partly used for strictly academic uses and the rest of it rented for uses in no way educational, with a result of taxability of the rented part, but not of the other part.
By leasing the premises during the summer the corporation is enabled to increase its income applicable to the purposes of its creation. Temple Grove Seminary v. Cramer, 98 N.Y. 121, 126 (1885) (citation omitted); cf. St. Paul's Church v. Concord, 75 N.H. 420, 426, 75 A. 531 (1910) (concluding, under prior law, that "an occasional and temporary occupation by third parties who pay for the privilege [did not] deprive[ ] the property of its nontaxable character" as a house of public worship and that "[i]f there is no substantial abandonment of the property by the church to uses other than those it was designed to promote, the receipt of pay for its temporary use, when not needed or desired for religious services, is merely incidental and subsidiary"). Here, Camp Marist is a residential summer camp on Ossipee Lake that serves children aged six to sixteen.
In determining the meaning of ambiguous statutory language, an appreciation of the results which may follow from one possible construction or another may, on occasion, be conclusive as to the correct construction to be placed upon the language, since an irrational, impractical or excessive result presumably could not have been intended by the Legislature. Roland Park Co. v. State, 80 Md. 448, 31 A. 298; Commonwealth v. Peoples, 345 Pa. 576, 28 A.2d 792; People's Holding Co. v. Bray, 118 Conn. 568, 173 A. 233; St. Paul's Church v. City of Concord, 75 N.H. 420, 75 A. 531, 27 L.R.A., (N.S.,) 910. Since exemptions no less than other portions of a statute are entitled to the application of the rule of reasonable construction, a particular construction of an exemption will be adopted when such construction appears to be the only reasonable one in accordance with the underlying legislative intent which will give a fixed, permanent and certain rule easily applied to future cases. 50 Am. Jur., Statutes, § 431; Langdon v. Doud, 6 Allen, (Mass.,) 423.
* * * Scholastic strictness of definition cannot be adopted if it prevents" a "reasonable construction." St. Paul's Church v. Cityof Concord, 75 N.H. 420, 75 A. 531 (1910). Exceptions are implied to give effect to the general legislative intent shown by the context; they may arise by the law of reason, though not expressly mentioned. Preston v. Browder, 1 Wheat. 115, 4 L.Ed. 50 (1816); Cram v. Chicago, B. Q.R. Co., 84 Neb. 607, 122 N.W. 31; 85 Neb. 586, 123 N.W. 1045 (1909), affirmed 228 U.S. 70, 33 S.Ct. 437, 57 L.Ed. 734 (1913); Guaranty Trust Company of N.Y. v. United States, 304 U.S. 126, 58 S.Ct. 785, 82 L.Ed. 1224 (1937).
It is argued for the defendant that "houses of public worship" include only "such buildings as were then [1842] usually and popularly termed churches and used for the encouragement of religion and piety, which in the Bill of Rights (art. 6) it is declared `will give the best and greatest security to government.'" St. Paul's Church v. Concord, 75 N.H. 420, 424. In that case the question was whether the plaintiff's parish house was a public house of worship, in spite of the fact that it was used frequently for non-religious purposes.
Rule of strict construction of tax exemption yields to legislative intent. 25 R.C.L. 1093, Sec. 309; 26 R.C.L. 314, Sec. 274; Adams Cty. v. Catholic Diocese of Natchez, 71 So. 17, 110 Miss. 890; Bd. of Sup'rs of Warren Cty. v. Vicksburg Hospital, 162 So. 382, 173 Miss. 805; Leaf Hotel Corp. v. City of Hattiesburg, 150 So. 779, 168 Miss. 304; 61 C.J. 395, Sec. 396; Ritchie v. City of Green Bay (Wis.), 254 N.W. 113, 95 A.L.R. 1081; Y.M.C.A. of Lincoln v. Lancaster Cty., 106 Neb. 105, 182 N.W. 593, 34 A.L.R. 1060; Trotter v. State of Tenn., 290 U.S. 354, 54 Sup. Ct. 138, 78 L.Ed. 358; Bistline v. Bassett (Idaho), 272 P. 696, 62 A.L.R. 323; Pan American Petroleum Co. v. Miller, State Tax Collector, 122 So. 393, 154 Miss. 565; St. Paul's Church v. Concord, 75 N.H. 420, 75 A. 531, 27 L.R.A. (N.S.) 910; Bottum v. Knudtson (N.D.), 276 N.W. 150. The gasoline tax of Mississippi is a direct tax on the bank and as such is an unauthorized tax on a federal instrumentality.
But, as is said in Y.M.C.A. of Lincoln v. Lancaster County, 106 Neb. 105, 111, 182 N.W. 593, 595, 34 A.L.R. 1060, 1064, "The rule does not call for a strained construction, adverse to the real intention, but the judicial interpretation of such a statute should always be reasonable." And in St. Paul's Church v. City of Concord, 75 N.H. 420, 423, 75 A. 531, 532, 533, 27 L.R.A. (N.S.) 910, Ann. Cas. 1912A, 350: "If the so-called 'rule of strict construction,' as applied to statutes exempting certain property from taxation, is so strictly applied as to render the exempting language so narrow and restricted as to defeat the apparent legislative purpose, it is clear that too much sacredness is attached to a mere rule, and that it should be either abrogated or applied with more liberality and reason * * * * A reasonable construction must be given to the statute.