and between the board of county commissioners of any county and the owner of such indebtedness or any portion thereof, by which it is mutually agreed by and between the parties to compromise the said existing indebtedness for a sum less than the amount due, then said board of county commissioners shall be and it hereby is authorized and empowered to enter into a contract with the owners or holders of any such indebtedness, by resolution, whereby said board of county commissioners shall agree and promise and pledge the credit of the county to pay the amount of the said indebtedness mutually agreed to be paid and compromised.

Sec. 3. The said board of county commissioners, whenever it has effected the compromise of any such indebtedness and has agreed with the owners and holders of any such indebtedness as to the amount of such indebtedness it will pay and liquidate, may also compromise and adjust the rate of interest said indebtedness shall bear, which in no event shall be more than four per centum per annum; and, whenever said indebtedness is evidenced by coupon bonds, said board of county commissioners may compromise and adjust the amount of the indebtedness as evidenced by the coupons attached to said bonds it will pay and liquidate, which, in no case shall be more than four per centum per annum upon the principal indebtedness; and said board of county commissioners is authorized and empowered to enter into a contract with the owner and holder of such interest and coupon indebtedness by resolution whereby said board of county commissioners shall agree and promise and pledge the credit of the county to pay the amount of the said indebtedness so compromised and mutually agreed to be paid.

Sec. 4. The terms of the compromise effected, as provided for in this act, shall be by the board of county commissioners stamped upon the back of any and all bonds outstanding against the county making the same, and if said county shall default for a period of one year in the payment of the interest becoming due upon any of the compromised indebtedness, then the whole of such indebtedness as it originally existed before such compromise was effected shall become due as if no such compromise had been made. The terms of said compromise which said board is.hereby required to stamp and endorse upon the back of said bonds shall recite that all of said indebtedness shall become due and be payable in the event default is made for a period of one year in the payment of interest on any of said bonded indebtedness in the following language, viz: "The indebtedness evidenced by this bond. is compromised at per centum (here insert per centum agreed upon between board and owners of bonds) of its face

value; if interest coupons remain unpaid one year after presentation and demand, then entire indebtedness evidenced by this bond shall again become due and payable and this compromise is void and of no effect." And upon the back of the coupons attached to said bond the following shall be stamped and endorsed: "Indebtedness herein compromised; see bond No." (here insert number of bond to which coupon is attached).

Sec. 5. Any of the coupons compromised as herein provided shall be receivable in payment of taxes levied for all county purposes, by the holders of any such coupons.

Sec. 6. This act shall be in force and take effect from and after its passage.

CHAPTER 96.

AN ACT AMENDING SECTION 2 OF CHAPTER 72 OF THE SESSION LAWS OF 1901. H. B. No. 148; Approved March 18, 1903.

CONTENTS.

Sec. 1. Section 2, chapter 72, Laws of 1901, regarding assessments against real estate and publication of notice of assessments Amended.

Sec. 2. Section 5, chapter 72, Laws of 1901, regarding times of payment of assessments and issue of sewer certificates. Amended.

Be it enacted by the Legislative Assembly of the Territory of New Mexico:

Section 1. That section 2 of chapter 72 of the acts of the Legislative Assembly of the Territory of New Mexico, approved March 20, 1901, entitled "An Act for the construction and maintenance of sewers in the towns and cities of the territory," be and the same is hereby amended so as to read as follows: "Section 2. If said city council or board of trustees shall elect to assess against said lots and pieces of land abutting on said line of sewer or sewers, or so near thereto as to be in the opinion of said city council or board of trustees benefited by the construction thereof, a part or all of the cost of such construction they shall record the amount so elected to be so assessed, and shall proceed to apportion said amount among said lots and pieces of land according to the frontage thereof, so that each front foot of such lots and pieces of land shall pay its proportionate share of the total cost of such construction, and shall assess such amount so determined against each of such lots and pieces of land, and shall for one month, in some newspaper published within the limits of said municipality where said sewer or sewers are to be built, or if there be no daily newspaper there published, then for

four successive weeks in some weekly newspaper therein published, a notice containing a brief description of the lots and pieces of land to be so assessed, and the amount to be assessed against each, and shall in said notice state that according to the provisions of this act any owner or owners in whole or in part or their legal representatives, has the right within ten days after the date of the last publication of said notice, stating the date, to bring suit in the district court having jurisdiction according to law then existing over the controversy, to review the action of said city council or board of trustees."

at

Sec. 2. That section 5 of said act be and it is hereby amended so as to read as follows: "Section 5. Said assessments may be made payable in ten annual payments. The first payment to be made at the time the general taxes of said municipality are next due, whether it be a semi-annual or annual, time for the payment of the same. The second payment, one year thereafter, the following payments annually thereafter. Interest at a rate not to exceed six per cent. per annum in the discretion of said city council, or board of trustees, shall be charged upon any balances or amounts not paid when the same are due. The property owner, may, his option, pay any installment or the whole of such assessment before the same is due, and interest thereon shall cease from the time of such payment. The said city council or board of trustees are hereby authorized to issue certificates to be designated "sewer certificates" to the amount of such assessment running for a period of eleven years, and payable in equal annual installments from and after the date of the issuance thereof. Such certificates shall be issued for convenient amounts, shall be negotiable in form and shall bear interest from date at the rate not to exceed six per cent. per annum, in the discretion of said city council or board of trustees. Said certificates shall be issued to the person or persons entitled to receive the same and shall state that they are issued in payment for the construction of said sewer or sewers. They shall be payable from money received from the assessments above provided for, and any deficiency in the fund to pay said certificates, shall be paid from the general revenues of said municipality, and said certificates may be redeemed at the option of the municipality issuing them at any time before maturity."

Sec. 3. This act shall be in full force and effect from and after its passage.

CHAPTER 97.

AN ACT AUTHORIZING AND EMPOWERING THE BOARD OF EDUCATION OF THE CITY OF SANTA FE AND TERRITORY OF NEW MEXICO, TO PROVIDE FOR THE ERECTION OF A PUBLIC SCHOOL BUILDING, AND MAKING PROVISIONS FOR MEANS TO ERECT THE SAME. C. S. for H. R. No. 143; Approved March 18, 1903.

CONTENTS.

Sec. 1.

Sec. 2. Sec. 3. Sec. 4

Sec. 5. Sec. 6.

Bond issue to erect school building authorized. Form. Maturity. Rate of
interest. On petition question of bond issue to be submitted to vote.
Form of ticket.

Special tax levy to pay interest on bonds. Provision for sinking fund.
Sale of bonds.

Material and labor to be furnished by penitentiary. Proviso.

Board of education to provide grounds, material and labor.
Donation of land. Description.

Be it enacted by the Legislative Assembly of the Territory of New
Mexico:

Section 1. For the purpose of erecting a suitable and commodious public school building in the City of Santa Fe in this territory, the board of education of the City of Santa Fe, of the Territory of New Mexico, is hereby authorized and empowered on or after the 1st day of June, A. D. 1903, and prior to the 1st day of November, A. D. 1903, to issue the bonds of said board of education of the City of Santa Fe in the Territory of New Mexico, as a body corporate, to the amount of twenty-eight thousand dollars ($28,000.00), or so much thereof as may be required, said bonds to be of the denomination of one hundred dollars ($100.00) or any multiple thereof, not exceeding one thousand dollars ($1,000.00), to be made payable to bearer and redeemable at any time after twenty years after the date thereof and to become absolutely due and payable thirty years after the date thereof, to bear interest from the date thereof at the rate of five per centum per annum, payable semi-annually at some national bank or trust company in the City of New York, State of New York, such interest to be evidenced by coupons representing each six months period of interest, attached to said bond; said bonds shall be signed by the board of education of the City of Santa Fe of the Territory of New Mexico, by its president and sealed with the seal of said board and attested by the secretary of said board and the coupons thereof shall bear a fac-simile of the signature of the secretary of said board, which shall be engraved thereon; said bonds shall be numbered commencing with one and running upwards, the coupons of each bond shall bear

the number of the bond and its relative number to other coupons on the same bond and shall show the date thereof, when due and payable and that it is for interest on the particular bond to which it is attached for the six months terminating on the date when it becomes due and payable. Should seventy-five of the legal voters of the City of Santa Fe, who are the owners of taxable property not exempt from taxation for school purposes in the said city of Santa Fe on which each of them has paid taxes for the year 1902, within thirty days after the passage of this act, petition the said board of education of the said City of Santa Fe to cause to be submitted to a vote of the legal voters in the said City of Santa Fe the question whether or not said bonds hereinbefore provided for shall be issued, it shall be the duty of said board of education to request the mayor and the city council of the said City of Santa Fe to order an election to be held within forty days thereafter to vote upon the question as to whether said bonds shall be issued or not, and thereupon the said mayor and city council shall order an election to be held in the various wards of said city, at which all persons, who may be qualified voters in said city under the laws of the Territory of New Mexico and who were registered as such at the last city election of the City of Santa Fe, shall be entitled to vote. The ticket which they shall vote, shall be in either of the following forms:

"For public school house bonds of the City of Santa Fe— Yes." or:

"For public school house bonds of the City of Santa Fe-No." And if a majority of those voting shall vote "yes," such vote shall be considered as consenting to the issue of said bonds and the said board shall be authorized to issue the same; but if a majority of those voting shall vote "no," such vote shall be considered as being opposed to the issue of said bonds and the said board of education shall not have the right to issue the same.

Should no petition be made, as herein provided, by seventyfive owners of taxable property as before mentioned within thirty days from the date of this act, then the said board of education shall be authorized and empowered to issue said bonds without further delay or any further authorization.

Sec. 2. To secure the payment of interest on each of the bonds which may be issued, according to the provisions of the last preceding section, as it falls due and also the principal of said bonds, the said board of education of the City of Santa Fe is hereby authorized and required, after it shall have determined to issue said bonds, to fix a rate of tax levy, to be levied on all of the property subject to taxation in the