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     The question of charitable donations, how much and to
whom, leaves me in a quandary, first because of my own
peculiar relationship to capital, in that I like first to
preserve it, but then to distribute it to create and sustain
human relationships.  I do not like to give it to
organizations, because organizations are unsuitable partners
for human relationships.  Is my reluctance valid? Are my
explanations anything more than pretexts to justify my
stinginess?

     How much, if anything, to donate to charitable
organizations, and to which ones?  Why should one give to a
charitable organization rather than to an individual?  What
is a charitable organization?

     How does a charitable organization differ from a
governmental organization?  Why isn't the government a
charitable organization?  What function does a charitable
organization fulfill that isn't also a governmental function?
What is more appropriate to charity than education,
libraries, medical services, fire protection, the "peace
corps", cultural enterprises, museums, foundations to
subsidize the arts.

     Would not a "perfect" socialist state preclude the need
for and obviate the functions of "charitable corporations."
Isn't the term "charitable corporation" an oxymoron?  Isn't
the political function of charitable corporations to blunt
and to mitigate the cruelty of the business corporation?
Doesn't the charitable corporation have a major role in
facilitating capitalism's indifference to the welfare of ones
neighbor?


     Whatever the lawyers might conclude, - and the legal
status of government, ironically and paradoxically, has
presented the lawyers with uncertainties that they have never
been able to resolve.  They speak of municipal corporations,
but they argue (I can't remember in what context,) that the
government is not a legal person.  If the government is not a
charitable corporation, I don't know what is?  Why should not
the government be deemed a charitable coropration, since it
reflects the will of "the people" and in a democracy, bu
definition, the will of the people is the highest good.
Shouldn't therefore our tax dollars be deemed a donation to
charity?

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Copyright 2006, Ernst Jochen Meyer
