[Foundation-l] Foundation vs. charity

Fred Bauder fredbaud at fairpoint.net
Tue Apr 26 19:05:07 UTC 2011


>>From a "New York Times" blog post about the use of the word "foundation"
> versus the use of the word "charity":
>
>> Some charities, however, have the word "Foundation" in their official
>> names. Examples of these are the Yele Haiti Foundation, the New York
>> Foundation for the Arts, the William J. Clinton Foundation and the
>> Wikimedia Foundation. Despite their names, all of them are charities;
>> they rely on donations from others to sustain themselves and the
>> programs
>> and services they offer. On second reference, any one of them should be
>> referred to as a "charity," not a "foundation."
>
> Source: http://topics.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/04/26/phrases-gone-astray-2/
>
> It appears that nobody appears to actually follow this rule (including
> the
> "New York Times"), but I find the nuance interesting. I imagine one would
> perform better than the other during fundraising; perhaps there's hard
> data
> on that.
>
> MZMcBride

There isn't any "rule" more a suggested guideline with respect to "On
second reference".

Foundation is not a legal term; a charitable exemption could be granted
to either a trust or a corporation. If it is "founded" a corporation
might be funded by a trust established by the founder.

However; there a sense in which Jimmy Wales founded and funded the
Wikimedia Foundation, but not with vast funds.

Fred






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