CERTIFICATE OF EXPIRATION OF CORPORATE EXISTENCE.

NATIONAL

To the COMPTROLLER OF THE CURRENCY,

Washington.`

BANK

SIR: It is hereby certified that the corporate existence of

in the State of

located at

having expired at close of business on the

day of the bank is now closing its affairs under the provisions of section 7 of the act of July 12, 1882.

In testimony whereof I have, by instruction of the board of directors of said association, hereto subscribed my name and affixed the seal of said association aforesaid, the day and year above written.

at

[SEAL OF BANK.]

President or Cashier.

Notice of liquidation by reason of expiration of corporate existence must be published for a period of two months in a newspaper in the city of New York, and also in a newspaper published in the place in which the bank is located. (See sec. 5221, Rev. Stat.) Certificates of the publishers that the required publication has been made, together with a slip containing notice from one issue of each paper, should be sent to the Comptroller of the Currency. Form for use in this connection follows:

day of

Bank

is closing up its affairs, its corporate existence having expired at close of business on the All note holders and others, creditors of said association, are therefore hereby notified to present the notes and other claims against the association for payment.

President or Cashier.

Dated

The settlement of the affairs of a bank, at expiration of charter, should be effected in the same manner as in the case of liquidation by resolution of shareholders.

111. Domestic branch banks.

CHAPTER 9.

BRANCH BANKS.

| 112. Foreign branch banks.

111. DOMESTIC BRANCH BANKS.

The only provision in the national-bank act relating to branch banks is found in section 5155, United States Revised Statutes, and reads as follows:

It shall be lawful for any bank or banking association, organized under State laws and having branches, the capital being joint and assigned to and used by the mother bank and branches in definite proportions, to become a national banking association in conformity with existing laws and to retain and keep in operation its branches, or such one or more of them as it may elect to retain.

*

The granting of this special privilege to converting State banks and the absence of any similar provision in the law with respect to domestic branches of national banks of primary organization have always been construed by the Comptroller to imply that banks of the latter class were not permitted to have domestic branches. The section cited absolutely restricts branch banks of converted associations to such as have a definite proportion of the capital of the parent bank assigned to them, and it is not to be assumed that the law contemplated that associations of primary organization should be permitted to assign any portion of their capital to and operate domestic branches.

This fact is further to be inferred from section 5138, United States Revised Statutes, which prohibits the formation of associations with less capital than $200,000 in cities of population exceeding 50,000, and with less than a specified capital in places with population less than 50,000.

To permit the establishment of domestic branch banks would not only render possible an evasion of the provisions of section 5138, but tend to discourage the organization of banking associations which, in the absence of such branches, might be formed.

Section 5134 provides in part that the organization certificate of a national bank shall show "the place where its operations of discount and deposit are to be carried on," and section 5190 that "the usual business of each national banking association shall be transacted at an office or banking house (not offices or banking houses) located in the place (not places) specified in its organization certificate.”

The words "place" and "at an office or banking house" have always been construed by the Comptroller to mean the legal domicile of the corporation, and this construction is sustained by the Solicitor of the Treasury in an opinion rendered August 10, 1899, on the question of the right of a national bank to establish and maintain an auxiliary cash room at some point distant from its banking house, for the purpose of receiving deposits and paying checks. The solici

tor says:

This section (5190, U. S. Rev. Stat.) contemplates that the usual business of a national banking association shall be transacted at one office or banking house, and as receiving deposits and paying checks belong to the "usual business" of a bank, I am of the opinion that the statute does not authorize the establishment of an auxiliary cash room in a different part of the city for the purpose proposed. Besides, it may be observed that if a national banking association can lawfully establish and maintain a separate office for receiving deposits and paying checks, it could as well establish as many such auxiliary cash rooms in the city of its corporate residence as its business might require; and, indeed, the entire business of the bank might be parceled out and conducted in the same way all over the city.

The District Court of the United States, in the case of Armstrong v. Second National Bank of Springfield (38 Fed. Rep., 883), involving among other things the question of the right of a national bank to cash a check elsewhere than at its banking house, held that—

Under this section (5190) it certainly would not be competent for a national bank to provide for the cashing of checks upon it at any other place than at its office or banking house.

If, therefore, it is unlawful for a national bank to cash a check elsewhere than at its banking house, it is likewise unlawful for it to discount notes or to receive deposits elsewhere, for one is as much a part of the "usual business" of a bank as the other. As it is obviously impossible for a bank to transact its entire business within the four walls of any single building, it is not held that the law contemplates that the "entire business," as distinguished from its "usual business," shall be transacted in its banking house.

In the case of The Merchants National Bank of Boston v. The State National Bank (10 Wall., 604) it was held in this connection that

66

The provision requiring the "usual business" of the association to be transacted at an office or banking house specified in its organization certificate " must be construed reasonably, and a part of the legitimate business of the association which can not be transacted at the banking house may be done elsewhere.

The question involved in this case was the right of the bank's officers to purchase gold elsewhere than at its banking house, and the court held that

The gold must necessarily have been bought, if at all, at the buying or selling bank or at some third locality. The power to pay was vital to the power to buy, and inseparable from it.

The "legitimate business" of a bank, therefore, which a reasonable construction of the law would permit to be done elsewhere than at its banking house would seem to be restricted to transactions similar in character to that involved in the decision quoted, and not the ordinary and usual business of receiving deposits and cashing checks. While the national-bank act does not expressly prohibit the establishment and maintenance of domestic branch banks or agencies by associations of primary organization, the implication to that effect is clear, and the Attorney General of the United States, in an opinion rendered on May 11, 1911 (before the passage of the Federal reserve act, authorizing the establishment of branches in foreign countries, dependencies or insular possessions of the United States), in the case of the Lowry National Bank of Atlanta, Ga., which desired to establish branch banks within the limits of that city, held that

First. Independently of section 5190, Revised Statutes, a national bank is not, under its charter, authorized to establish a branch or coordinate office for the purpose of carrying on a general banking business in the place designated in its certificate of organization; and,

Second. That section 5190, Revised Statutes, properly construed, restricts the carrying on of the general banking business by a national bank to one office or banking house in the place designated in the association's certificate of organization.

That the act does not contemplate the operation of domestic branch banks by national banks of primary organization is evidenced by the fact that in 1892 a special act was approved authorizing the operation of a branch by a Chicago national bank on the World's Fair grounds. In 1901 similar legislation was enacted by Congress in connection with the Louisiana Purchase Exposition, held in 1904.

112. FOREIGN BRANCH BANKS.

Section 25 of the Federal reserve act, as amended by the act of September 7, 1916, contains the following provision:

Any national banking association possessing a capital and surplus of $1,000,000 or more may file application with the Federal Reserve Board for permission to exercise, upon such conditions and under such regulations as may be prescribed by the said board, either or both of the following powers:

First. To establish branches in foreign countries or dependencies or insular possessions of the United States for the furtherance of the foreign commerce of the United States, and to act if required to do so as fiscal agents of the United States.

Second. To invest an amount not exceeding in the aggregate ten per centum of its paid-in capital stock and surplus in the stock of one or more banks or

corporations chartered or incorporated under the laws of the United States or of any State thereof, and principally engaged in international or foreign banking, or banking in a dependency or insular possession of the United States either directly or through the agency, ownership, or control of local institutions in foreign countries, or in such dependencies or insular possessions.

Such application shall specify the name and capital of the banking association filing it, the powers applied for, and the place or places where the banking operations proposed are to be carried on. The Federal Reserve Board shall have power to approve or to reject such application in whole or in part if for any reason the granting of such application is deemed inexpedient, and shall also have power from time to time to increase or decrease the number of places where such banking operations may be carried on.

Every national banking association operating foreign branches shall be required to furnish information concerning the condition of such branches to the Comptroller of the Currency upon demand, and every member bank investing in the capital stock of banks or corporations described under subparagraph two of the first paragraph of this section shall be required to furnish information concerning the condition of such banks or corporations to the Federal Reserve Board upon demand, and the Federal Reserve Board may order special examinations of the said branches, banks, or corporations at such time or times as it may deem best.

Before any national bank shall be permitted to purchase stock in any such corporation the said corporation shall enter into an agreement or undertaking with the Federal Reserve Board to restrict its operations or conduct its business in such manner or under such limitations and restrictions as the said board may prescribe for the place or places wherein such business is to be conducted. If at any time the Federal Reserve Board shall ascertain that the regulations prescribed by it are not being complied with, said board is hereby authorized and empowered to institute an investigation of the matter, and to send for persons and papers, subpoena witnesses, and administer oaths in order to satisfy itself as to the actual nature of the transactions referred to. Should such investigation result in establishing the failure of the corporation in question, or of the national bank or banks which may be stockholders therein, to comply with regulations laid down by the said Federal Reserve Board, such national banks may be required to dispose of stockholdings in the said corporation upon reasonable notice.

Every such national banking association shall conduct the accounts of each foreign branch independently of the accounts of other foreign branches established by it and of its home office, and shall at the end of each fiscal period transfer to its general ledger the profit or loss accrued at each branch as a separate item.

Any director or other officer, agent, or employee of any member bank may, with the approval of the Federal Reserve Board, be a director or other officer, agent, or employee of any such bank or corporation above mentioned in the capital stock of which such member bank shall have invested as herein before provided, without being subject to the provisions of section eight of the act approved October fifteenth, nineteen hundred and fourteen, entitled "An act to supplement existing laws against unlawful restraints and monopolies, and for other purposes."