bills or notes of said bank in circulation exceeding its capital stock actually paid in, the directors for the time being shall forfeit and pay the sum of one thousand dollars each, and the charter of such bank shall thereupon be null and void.

SEC. 20. If any bank shall make and issue any bank bill payable at any place other than its own banking room or place of business, the president or cashier, or other person who shall sign such bank bill, shall each forfeit the sum of fifty dollars.

SEC. 21. If any bank shall issue or pass any note, bill, order or check for a less sum than one dollar, with intent that the same shall be circulated as a currency, the president or cashier, or other person who shall sign such note, bill, order or check, shall forfeit and pay for every such offence the sum of one hundred dollars.

SEC. 22. If any bank shall hereafter issue, pay out or pass any bill or note payable in any thing but gold or silver, the president or cashier who shall sign such bill or note shall respectively forfeit four-fold the amount of such bill or note.

SEC. 23. If any person shall pass or tender in payment any bank bill payable in any thing but gold or silver, he shall forfeit and pay four-fold the amount of such bank bill.

SEC. 24. If any officer of any bank shall fraudulently manage or conduct the affairs or business of such bank, whereby any person shall be defrauded, such officer shall and may be prosecuted in the supreme court by indictment; and on conviction shall and may be fined to and for the use of the state, at the discretion of the court, not exceeding five thousand dollars.

SEC. 25. When any incorporated bank shall for the space of five days after demand in writing left with the cashier of said bank, refuse or neglect upon application therefor to pay any money deposited therein, or which has been collected on any security deposited in said bank for collection, to the person having legal right to demand and receive the same; or shall refuse, upon demand and application as aforesaid, to deliver out to any person having legal right as aforesaid, any security or money deposited in such bank for safe keeping, or for collection and not collected, or any specific article deposited therein for safe keeping; such bank shall be liable to pay in damages to the party aggrieved, the value of the article or the amount of the money or security so detained, with interest from the demand, and such additional damages as the court or jury before which the same may be tried shall think reasonable.

SEC. 26. Every debt contracted with or actually owing to any bank on the twenty-fifth day of June, eighteen hundred and thirty-six, and all the renewals thereof, shall and may be sued for and recovered by the bank owning the same, in the manner and by the form of process and before the court pointed out in the ninth section of the act entitled "an act to regulate process against banks and for other purposes therein mentioned," passed in the year 1822; and said section, so far as relates to such debts and the renewals thereof, is not repealed by this act.

SEC. 27. One third of the stockholders in interest in any bank are hereby authorized to call meetings of the stockholders, at their banking room, for the transaction of business, with the same legal effect as if the meeting had been called by the directors of the bank; first giving such notice of the time and place of meeting as may be prescribed in their charter.

SEC. 28. All penalties incurred under this act where special provision is not made to the contrary, may be sued for and recovered by action of debt; one half to and for the use of the person who shall sue for the same, and the other half to and for the use of the state.

An Act to prevent the Circulation of Private Securities as a

1. Penalty for passing private notes, &c., 2. All such notes, &c., to be void.

as currency.

It is enacted by the General Assembly, as follows:

SECTION 1. If any person shall issue or pass any note, bill, order or check, other than the notes or bills of some bank incorporated by this state, or the United States, or some one of them, with intent that the same shall be circulated as a currency, he shall be fined for every such offence the sum of one hundred dollars..

SEC. 2. All notes, bills, orders or checks, which shall be issued or passed as aforesaid, other than the notes or bills of any bank incorporated as aforesaid, and checks drawn on any such bank, shall be utterly void, and no action shall be thereon sustained in any court in this state.

An Act declaring Towns to be Bodies Corporate, and prescribing the manner of recovering debts due from Towns.

SECTION

1. Towns, bodies corporate.

2. Towns may make by-laws, inflict fines, &c.

3. Moderator to preside at all town meetings; if absent, a moderator pro tempore to be appointed.

4. Disorderly behaviour in town meeting
how punished.

5. Moderator to put all questions to vote.
6. Moderator to receive all votes.
7. Quorum of town meetings.
8. Towns may assess and collect taxes.
9. No tax to be ordered unless named in
warrant for town meeting, nor town's
land sold-town clerk to issue war-
rant for town meetings.

10. Town treasurer to issue warrant for
town meetings if town clerk be dead.
11. Town clerks to cause town meetings

It is enacted by the General Assembly, as follows:

SECTION 1. The inhabitants of each town are hereby declared to be a body corporate, and as such may commence and prosecute any suit or action, in any court proper to try the same, and may also defend any suit or action commenced against them.

SEC. 2. Each town shall be and is hereby fully empowered to make and ordain all such acts, laws and orders for the well ordering, managing and directing of all the prudential affairs of such town as shall seem most conducive to the welfare and good order thereof; and to inflict fines and penalties for the non-observance of the same, not exceeding ten dollars, or more than one month's imprisonment, for any offence; provided, that all such acts, laws and orders are not repugnant to the constitution or laws of this state.

SEC. 3. In all meetings of the electors of each town, the moderator of the town shall preside, if present; when he shall be necessarily absent, the town may elect a moderator pro tempore; the town clerk, and in his absence the town treasurer, presiding in such election. Moderators shall have power and authority to manage and regulate the business of each meeting, and to maintain peace and good order therein.

SEC. 4. If any person shall conduct himself in a disorderly manner in any town meeting, the moderator may crder him to withdraw from the meeting, and on his refusal may order the town sergeant or any constable present, or any other persons, to take him from the meeting and to confine him in

some convenient place until the meeting shall be adjourned; and the person so refusing to withdraw shall for each offence forfeit a sum not exceeding twenty dollars, to the use of the

town.

SEC. 5. The moderator of every town meeting shall, on a motion being made and seconded relative to any business regularly before such meeting, after having heard all the electors entitled to vote thereon who shall be desirous of being heard, cause the votes of such electors present to be taken thereon.

SEC. 6. In all town elections and on all questions to be decided by ballot, the votes shall be received by the moderators or wardens, and by no other person; and like proceedings shall be had in such cases and in all town meetings, as far as may be, as are prescribed in the twenty-third and thirtieth sections of the act entitled "an act to regulate the election of civil officers."

SEC. 7. When the inhabitants of any town do not exceed three thousand by the last preceding census, seven electors at least shall be necessary to constitute a legal town meeting; and where the inhabitants of any town shall exceed that number, fifteen electors at least shall be necessary to constitute such meeting; and all doings relating to town affairs shall be decided by a majority of the votes of the electors present entitled to vote on the question.

SEC. 8. The electors of each and every town who are entitled to vote on any proposition to impose a tax shall have power and authority, when legally convened, to make such acts and laws in their towns for the raising such sums of money only as shall be by them thought needful for the defraying the necessary incidental charges and expenses thereof, or paying the town debts, by a tax on real or personal estate or both; but no poll tax shall be levied or collected for any purpose whatever; and any town may include the said town's proportion of any state tax which may be assessed, in the assessment of such town tax, and pay the same out of the town treasury, provided the same shall be voted at a legal meeting of the said electors of such town.

SEC. 9. No vote shall be passed in any town meeting concerning the disposing of the town's land or making a tax, unless mention be made, and notice thereof given in the warrant given out for the warning of such meeting; and the town clerk of each town shall grant such warrant, unless in cases where the law otherwise directs; which warrant shall be di

rected to the town sergeant or to either of the constables of the town.

SEC. 10. Whenever any town clerk shall be removed by death or otherwise, the town treasurer of such town shall issue his warrant to warn the electors to assemble in town meeting, to choose a town clerk in the room of him so removed, which warrant shall be directed as aforesaid.

SEC. 11. It shall be the duty of each town clerk to cause the electors of their respective towns to be notified of any town meeting which shall be prescribed by law, and also of all other town meetings which shall be legally called; whenever seven of the electors of any town consisting of less than three thousand inhabitants, or whenever fifteen of the electors of any town consisting of more than that number, shall make a request in writing for the calling of a town meeting, to transact any business relating to such town, in respect to which they shall have a right to vote, and direct the same to the town clerk, it shall be the duty of such town clerk to cause the electors to be notified of the time and place when and where the same is to be holden, and of the business proposed to be transacted therein: the notice to the electors to meet in town meeting, when prescribed by law, shall be given by the said town clerk issuing his warrant, directed to the town sergeant or one of the constables of such town, requiring him to post up written notifications in three or more public places in such town, of the day for said meeting to be holden, and of the business required by law in such meeting to be transacted; the notice of meetings when called by request as aforesaid, shall be given by the town clerk issuing his warrant, directed to the town sergeant or constable, requiring them to give personal notice to the individual electors of such town entitled to vote on the business to be then transacted, of the time when and the place where said meeting is to be holden, and of the business therein to be transacted: provided, always, that it shall and may be lawful for any town to prescribe by law any other mode for warning the electors of their respective towns, to convene in town meeting, any thing herein to the contrary notwithstanding.

SEC. 12. Any town clerk who shall neglect or refuse to issue a warrant as directed by this act, and each town sergeant or constable who shall neglect or refuse to serve the same, as herein required shall severally forfeit for each neglect, fifty dollars; to be recovered by an action of debt, one half to the use of the town and the other half to the use of the person who shall sue for the same.