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Officers

prohibited from purchasing

of indebtedness.

CHAPTER LXXXVIII.

AN ACT to prevent certain Officers from dealing in certain Securities or Evidences of Debt. (1)—[Passed May 4, 1852.]

The People of the State of California, represented in Senate and
Assembly, do enact as follows:

SECTION 1. The state treasurer and comptroller, the several county, city, or town corporation officers of this state, are hereby excertain evidences pressly prohibited from purchasing or selling, or in any manner receiving to their own use or benefit, or to the use or benefit of any person or persons whatever, any state, county, or city warrants, scrip, orders, demands, claim or claims, or other evidences of indebtedness, against the state, or any county or city thereof.

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SEC. 2. The state treasurer and comptroller, all county, city, or town corporation officers, are prohibited from purchasing, or being interested, or receiving or selling or transferring, or causing to be purchased, received, sold or transferred, either in person, or by agent, or attorney, or by or through the agency or means of any person or persons whatever, any interest, claim, demand, or other evidence of indebtedness against the state, county, city, or town corporation thereof, either directly or indirectly, nor shall any clerk or employee of any such officer or officers, nor the commissioners employed or to be employed, to fund any county, city or town corporation indebtedness, be allowed to make any such purchase, sale or transfer, or to receive any agency from other parties to purchase, sell, transfer, or bargain in any manner for any state, county, city or town corporation, warrants, scrip, demands, or other evidence of indebtedness against the state, or any county, city or town corporation thereof.

SEC. 3. It shall, in all cases, be the duty of all officers who may be called upon to audit and allow the accounts of other state, county, city, or town corporation officers, to take and file an affidavit of said officer or officers that they have not violated any of the provisions of this act, and for that purpose all officers authorized by law to audit and allow accounts are hereby empowered and required to administer oaths, which shall have the same force and validity in all actions for perjury as if administered by a judicial officer.

(1) See chap. 87.

treasurers.

SEC. 4. It shall be the duty of the state treasurer, and the several Duty of county, city, or town corporation treasurers of the state, to refuse to redeem any warrants, scrip, orders or other evidences of indebtedness against the state or any county, city, or town corporation thereof, whenever it shall come to their knowledge that such warrant, scrip, or other evidence of indebtedness has been purchased, sold, received or transferred in violation of the provisions of this act.

indebtedness.

SEC. 5. All public officers herein referred to shall have the right Funded public to sell or transfer any evidence of public indebtedness, which may be issued according to law, and held by such officers for services rendered by them to the state, county, city, or town corporation, legally and justly due, and this act shall not be deemed to apply or to prevent the purchase, sale, or transfer of any funded public indebtedness whatever of the state, or of any county, city, or town corporation.

of this act.

SEC. 6. It shall be the duty of any officer charged with the dis- Enforcement bursement of any public moneys, or any evidence of public indebtedness when he shall be informed by affidavit of the violation of any of the provisions of this act, by any officer whose account is to be settled, audited or paid by him, to withhold any settlement or payment of the same, and to cause said officer to be prosecuted for a misdemeanor, and on conviction, any officer guilty of any violation of the provisions Penalties. of this act, shall be punished by fine not less than five hundred dollars or more than one thousand dollars, and shall be imprisoned in the state prison for a term not less than two months nor more than two years. Such conviction shall operate as a forfeiture of office, and the party convicted, shall forever be disqualified from holding any office of trust or profit in this state. Any person giving information which Informer to may lead to the conviction of any person under the provisions of this act, shall be entitled to receive one half of any fine assessed upon and collected from any such officer.

receive one half.

SEC. 7. All fines collected under the provisions of this act, shall Fines. be for the use of the county, except as above provided.

SEC. 8. The provisions of this act shall not be so construed as to Exceptions. prohibit any state officer from purchasing or selling county or city warrants, or any county or city officer from purchasing the warrants of the state, or of any other city or county, or to prevent any state, county, or city officer from selling or transferring such warrants or scrip as he may receive for his services, but none other.

SEC. 9. This act shall take effect from and after the first day of Commencement June, one thousand eight hundred and fifty-two.

of the act.

Holidays designated.

Days of grace.

CHAPTER LXXXIX.

AN ACT to designate the Holidays to be observed in the Acceptance
and Payment of Bills of Exchange and Promissory Notes.-
[Passed April 2, 1851.]

The People of the State of California, represented in Senate and
Assembly, do enact as follows:

SECTION 1. The following days, namely: the first day of January, the fourth day of July, the twenty-fifth day of December, commonly called Christmas day, shall for all purposes whatsoever as regards the presenting for payment or acceptance, and of the protesting and giving notice of the dishonor of bills of exchange, checks and promissory notes, made after the passage of this act, be treated and considered as is the first day of the week, usually called Sunday. Three days, commonly called days of grace, shall be allowed, except on sight bills or drafts; and any one of the holidays specified in this act coming within the three days of grace, shall be counted as one of such days.

Seven or more

persons may make, etc., a certificate.

CHAPTER XC.

AN ACT to provide for the Incorporation of Mutual Insurance
Companies.-[Passed April 26, 1851.]

The People of the State of California, represented in Senate and
Assembly, do enact as follows:

SECTION 1. Any seven or more persons who desire to form a mutual insurance company, shall make, sign, and acknowledge, before some officer competent to take the acknowledgment of deeds, and file in the office of the clerk of the county in which the business of the company shall be carried on, and a duplicate thereof in the office of the secretary of state, a certificate in writing, in which shall be stated the corporate name of the company, the proposed amount of the capital stock, the proposed term of its existence, not to exceed twenty years, the proposed number of shares of which its stock shall consist, the number of directors and their names who shall manage

the concerns of the company for the first year, and the names of the town and county in which the office of the company is to be established.

"Act concerning

applied.

SEC. 2. All the provisions of chapter second of the act entitled Provisions of "An Act concerning Corporations," passed April twenty-second, Corporations" eighteen hundred and fifty, excepting sections thirty-four, thirty-seven, forty-two, forty-three, fifty-one, and fifty-two of said chapter, shall be applicable to mutual insurance companies. (1)

certificate to

corporate.

SEC. 3. When the certificate shall have been filed as aforesaid, the The filing persons who shall have signed and acknowledged the same, and those create a body who shall thereafter subscribe to the capital stock, or who shall become insurers under such certificate of organization, shall be a body politic and corporate by the name stated in the certificate.

make calls.

SEC. 4. It shall be lawful for the directors to call in and demand Directors may from the stockholders respectively all such sums of money by them subscribed, at such times and in such payments or instalments as the directors shall deem proper, under the penalty of forfeiting the shares of stock subscribed for, and all previous payments made thereon, if a personal demand shall have been made at least six weeks previously, or if a notice requiring such payment shall have been published six successive weeks in some newspaper of the place where the business of said company is carried on, or if no newspaper be published in such place, then in a newspaper published nearest thereto.

insurance.

SEC. 5. Every company incorporated under this act may make insurance upon vessels, freight, money, goods, and effects, and against May make captivity of persons, and on the life of any person during his or her absence at sea, and on money lent on bottomry and respondentia, and may also make insurance against fire, on any dwelling-house, buildings, merchandise, or other property situated in the state of California, and may also make insurance upon the life of any person, whether at home or abroad, for a limited term, or during his or her natural life.

risk limited.

SEC. 6. No company incorporated under this act shall take on any Amount of single one risk, whether it be a marine risk, an insurance against fire, or an insurance on the life of any person, a sum exceeding one tenth part of their capital subscribed.

subscribers may

SEC. 7. Notes of the subscribers to the capital stock, approved by Notes of the directors of the company, and upon which shall have been paid be taken as not less than ten per cent. in cash, may be taken as part of the capital stock, and such notes shall be subject to such assessments, from time

(1) See page 286.

capital stock.

Policies to be paid in cash. Loans to stockholders prohibited.

When'

declaration of profits to be

made.

When policies may be issued.

Company not to engage in trade.

May make reinsurance.

to time as the directors of the company may require, but no debts shall be contracted, and no policies shall be issued by such company before such notes shall have been given, and such ten per cent. paid thereon. All premiums upon policies of insurance issued by such companies shall be required to be paid in cash. No loan of money shall be made by any such company to any stockholder thereto, and if any such loan shall be made to a stockholder, the officers who shall make it, or who shall assent thereto, shall be jointly and severally liable to the extent of such loan and interest for all the debts of the company contracted before the repayment of the sums so loaned. No declaration of profit shall be made until the net earnings of the company shall have accumulated to a sum equal in amount to the original capital stock subscribed, which shall there remain with the company as a cash capital, not subject to division amongst the stockholders until the business of the company shall have been closed, it debts paid, and its outstanding policies cancelled; and if any deficiency shall ever at any time occur in such cash capital, from any cause, no further division of profits shall take place until such deficiency shall have been made up entire.

SEC. 8. No company shall issue policies until the sum of two hundred thousand dollars shall have been subscribed, and conditions complied with, as required in section seventh.

SEC. 9. No company shall directly or indirectly deal or trade in buying or selling any goods, wares, merchandise, stock, or commodities whatever; but this shall not be construed to prevent such company from selling any goods, wares, merchandise, stock, or commodities which may have been hypothecated or pledged with them as securities, for the loan or investment of money, whenever the same is made in good faith to protect the company from loss upon such loan or investment.

SEC. 10. Companies incorporated under this act may cause themselves to be re-insured when deemed expedient against any risk or risks against which they have made or may make insurance.

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