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of American Charities 1. Historical Root of Charities America is a multinational country where people are comprised of immigrants from other countries all over the world and the culture was also diverse. But the main stream of its culture is the white Anglo-Saxon protestant’s religious values. The origin of American culture is from Europe, especially its motherland-----Britain. In America, the charitable ideology, rules and related laws also originated from European, of which England is the most important country. The first charitable foundation we know was Plato School which was founded by Plato in Athens the captain of ancient Greece. The main purpose of Plato’s founding the school was to study the universe, philosophy and so on. So some scholars thought that Plato School was the earliest philanthropic foundation. Ancient Rome followed the charity tradition of ancient Greece. Some charity organizations were founded in ancient Rome time. Some people also thought these organizations were the earlier charitable foundation. Those foundations received donation, and used these donation to help the sick and those in need and to do some religious activities. In the remote ancient times, charity activity was always related with religion. As soon as the rise of Christianity, it began to encourage people to donate. At the same time, the running of donation was also controlled by Zion or some related institution. As far as middle ages, the meaning of charity foundation was similar to those religious groups in some degree. These religious groups founded orphanages, hospitals, schools and some other similar organizations. These organizations’ funds were donated by disciples. The service those organizations supplied embodied the charity spirits which Christianity advocated. In Britain, the earlier kings, followed the custom of Rome, awarded Zion higher rights. Archbishop could still control charity foundations. Most of large charity foundations were controlled by Zion. Generally speaking, Zion gathered the funds through its rights, and then they began to interfere in political affairs. For the right of running charity foundation, fighting between Zion and government lasted 400 years. In 1601, Statute of Charitable Use issued by Elizabeth established government’s right of managing charity foundation. Another important point of this bill lied in the establishment of the principle that charity was not only public but also private. The bill also stipulated that the charity foundation would be given preferential treatment and exempted from taxes. All these promoted the development of charity. Its influence on the whole world went on till the present. The issue of “Law on Charity” ends the struggle between the throne and the power of church on the right of management of the charity foundation. In order to get rid of poverty, the government hoped to inspire the people–to-people charity through this bill to alleviate the class and social contradiction posed by the capitalism and industrialization. Till December of 1620, the puritans had arrived in America by Mayflower. And then, Europeans, especially British people began to immigrate to America without stopping. In the hard time of immigrating, many people received charity donations from charity or