67.
upon whom it casts obligations". They submitted that this was to be understood as rejection of the "object of command test". It is a statement that can be seen to have influenced the views expressed by Dawson J in The Tasmanian Dam Case and Re Dingjan. Further, the statement was made in the context of an argument that a law directed to all persons could be characterised as a law with respect to constitutional corporations. This was not because those bodies were the object of the law's command, but because those bodies were within the range of its command to all persons.
7(c)Fontana Films
157 By the time Fontana Films came to be decided, there had been controversy about what are "trading or financial corporations formed within the limits of the Commonwealth". In particular, in R v Trade Practices Tribunal; Ex parte St George County Council[1], the Court had held that a county council, established under the Local Government Act 1919 (NSW) for "local government purposes", empowered to sell electricity and sell and install electrical fittings and appliances, and pursuing only those activities, was not a trading corporation. In his dissenting opinion, Barwick CJ had said[2] that "a corporation whose predominant and characteristic activity is trading whether in goods or services" was a trading corporation. But this view did not then command the assent of a majority of the Court[3].
158 In R v Federal Court of Australia; Ex parte WA National Football League[4], St George County Council was distinguished. Associations incorporated under associations incorporation legislation, whose principal objects were the promotion, control and management of Australian Rules football matches, were held to be trading corporations. Mason J said[5]:
"'Trading corporation' is not and never has been a term of art or one having a special legal meaning. Nor, as the Chief Justice pointed out [in
