CHAP. 144.—An ACT to amend and re-enact an act approved March 11,
1908, entitled an act to amend and re-enact an act approved March
10, 1906, entitled an act to amend and re-enact an act entitled an
act to amend and re-enact sections 7 and 17, as amended by an act
entitled an act to amend and re-enact sections 7, 17 and 18 of an act
approved Iebruary 20, 1892, entitled an act to provide for the settle-
ment of the public debt of Virginia, not funded, et cetera, and vari-
ously amended January 31, 1894, January 23, 1896, January 25, 1898,
February 38, 1900, February 16, 1901, April 2, 1902, March 10, 1906,
March 11, 1908, and March 14, 1910, and to authorize the adjudi-
cation of the claims of the holders of certain bonds and coupons which
have been guaranteed by the Commonwealth, and the funding of the
same when so adjudicated.

Approved March 12, 1912.

An amendment in the nature of a substitute proposed by the
House of Delegates, to Senate Bill 147.

1. Be it enacted by the general assembly of Virginia, That
sections seven and seventeen of an act entitled an act to amend
and re-enact an act to amend, and re-enact sections seven, seven-
teen and eighteen of an act approved February twentieth, eigh-
teen hundred and ninety-two, entitled an act to provide for the
settlement of the public debt of Virginia, not funded, under the
provisions of an act to ascertain and declare Virginia’s equitable
share of the debt created before and actually existing at the
time of the partition of her territory and resources, and to pro-
vide for the issuance of bonds covering same, and the regular
and prompt payment of interest thereon, approved February
twentieth, eignteen hundred and ninety-two, and to provide for
carrying same Into effect, approved January thirty-first, eighteen
hundred and ninety-four, providing the time for which bonds is-
sued under this act after March thirty-first, eighteen hundred
and ninety-six, shall carry interest, and section three of said act
approved January twenty-third, eighteen hundred and ninety-
six, as amended by acts approved February third, nineteen hun-
dred, February sixteenth, nineteen hundred and one, April sec-
ond, nineteen hundred and two, March tenth, nineteen hundred
and six, Mlarch eleventh, nineteen hundred and eight, and March
fourteenth, nineteen hundred and ten, be amended and re-enact-
ed, so as to read as follows:

S¢. The commissioners of the sinking fund are hereby au-
thorized and required to receive on deposit for verification, class-
ification and exchange, such of said obligations of the state, as
may be presented to said commissioners, the said verification
and exchange for the new bonds of the obligations, so deposited.
to be conducted in the same manner as hereinbefore provided
with respect to the obligations deposited with the same bona-
holders’ committee, and the said commissioners of the sinking
fund shall issue to and distribute amongst said depositing cred-
itors, after they have fully complied with the terms of this act,
in exchange for the obligations so deposited, bonds authorized by
this act, as follows, namely, to each of the several classes of said
depositing creditors, the same proportion as the same class shall
receive under the distribution made by the commissioners for
the creditors represented by the bondholders’ committee; and
provided, that no obligations shall be received for such deposit
after the thirty-first day of December, nineteen hundred and
twelve, nor shall any coupon bonds be received, which do not
have attached thereto all coupons maturing after July 1st, eigh-
teen hundred and ninety-two; but for any such coupons as may
be missing, coupons of like class and amount, or face value there-
of in cash, may be received, the said cash, if paid, to be returned
if proper coupons are tendered within six months thereafter, and
each depositor shall, when he receives his distributive share of
said new issue of bonds, pay to the commissioners of the sink-
ing fund, three and one-half percentum in cash for the par
value of the bonds received by him, and said sinking fund com-
missioners shall cover the fund thus received into the treasury
of the commonwealth.

$17. The commissioners of the sinking fund are authorized,
if it shall seem to them, for the best interest of the common-
wealth, to make an extension of the time for the funding of the
outstanding evidences of debt due by the commonwealth, not
heretofore funded under said act of February twentieth, eighteen
hundred and ninety-two, for a period not extending beyond De-
cember thirty-first, nineteen hundred and thirteen.

2. All bonds under the provisions of this act shall carry in-
terest from the semi-annual period next preceding the date of
funding.

3. Be it further enacted, That if at any time within two years
from the passage of this act there should be presented to said
board of sinking fund commissioners, any bonds, coupons or
other obligations on which it is claimed that the commonwealth
of Virginia is liable by reason of having guaranteed the payment
of the principal sum or interest thereon, in whole or in part, the
said board of sinking fund commissioners shall refuse to fund
such obligations or interest until the liability of the common-
wealth on said guarantee shall be ascertained and determined
as hereinafter provided, and upon refusal of said board of sink-
ing fund commissioners to fund said obligations, it shall be
lawful for any bona fide holder of any such obligation to file a
petition in the circuit court of the city of Richmond, which is
hereby given jurisdiction for the purpose, setting forth in full
the amount and character of such alleged liability, together with
the grounds on which it is claimed that the commonwealth’s con-
tingent liability, if any, on such guarantee has become fixed and
absolute, and still exists in whole or in part, to which petition
the board of sinking fund commissioners shall be made de-
fendant and shall answer and defend the same.

The proceedings shall be conducted in all respects as chan-
cery causes are conducted, and in accordance with the principles,
rules and regulations and methods of procedure which obtain in
courts having general equity jurisdiction, and the said board of
sinking fund commissioners in said proceeding shall set up and
insist upon all defences, both legal and equitable, which the com-
monwealth would be entitled to insist upon if the proceeding
was directly against the commonwealth; provided, however, that
the said commissioners shall not interpose the technical plea of
the statute of limitations either as to the principal or interest
of said alleged obligations, unless in the judgment of said board
of sinking fund commissioners it is proper and necessary to
do so to protect the commonwealth from the payment of an
unjust and inequitable demand, for which the commonwealth
might otherwise be held liable; in which event said plea shall be
interposed at any time before final decree, but this waiver of
the technical plea of the statute of limitations shall not be held
or construed as in any way interfering with, affecting, weaken-
ing or impairing in any manner whatsoever any other legal or
equitable defense which may be interposed by the said board of
sinking fund commissioners in defense of said proceeding; and
provided further that any answer to be filed to said petition by
the said sinking fund commissioners, and any plea or other
written defense filed or offered by said sinking fund commis-
sioners need not be verified by affidavit, but shall be received by
the court and have the same force and effect as if the same was
verified by aflidavit in the mode prescribed by law.

If upon hearing the said circuit court shall be of opinion
that the petitioner has tailed to establish a present existing legal
or equitable claim against the commonwealth under the al-
leved guarantee, it shall dismiss the said petition with costs to
the defendant.

If upon said hearing the court shall be of opinion that the
petitioner has established an existing legal or equitable claim
against the commonwealth under and by virtue of the alleged
guarantee, it shall ascertain, and by its decree declare, the
amount both of principal and interest for which the commcn-
wealth is now legally or equitably bound, as follows: If the ob-
ligation upon which the commonwealth is held to be liable ma-
tured prior to July 1, 1891, then the ecurt shall fix the amount
of such claim as of the date of the maturity of the said obliga-
tion; but if such obligation matured after July 1, 1891, then the
court shall ascertain the amount due thereon as of said last men-
tioned date; and in either event the amount so ascertained shall
be fundable as old unfunded obligations under the act approved
the 20th day of February, 1892, but said decree or order shall
have no effect as a judgment or decree against the commonwealth
which may be enforced by execution or in any other way, but
it shall have the effect of a final determination of the amount
for which the state is bound, unless an appeal is taken from the
order as herein provided.

Either party to said petition may appeal, as of right, from the
decree or order of the said circuit court to the supreme court
of appeals of Virginia at any time within one year from the
date of the decree, in the mode prescribed by statute for ap-
peals in chancery or equity causes; and the said supreme court
of appeals shall proceed to hear and determine the same as in
other cases of appeal from orders or decrees in equity, and fi-
nally ascertain and fix the amount, if any, of principal and in-
terest for which the commonwealth is now legally or equitably
bound as of the dates hereinbefore mentioned, and declare the
same in its order or decree, but such decree or order of the su-
preme court of appeals shall not have force or effect as a judg-
ment or decree against the commonwealth.

Upon the final ascertainment of the amount of principal and
interest for which the commonwealth is now legally or equitably
bound, if any, under the proceedings herein authorized, the hold-
er or holders of such obligations so ascertained shall be entitled
to fund the same upon the terms and conditions set out in the
act, approved February 20, 1892, above referred to; provided,
that in no event shall the State of Virginia pay any costs in any
suit under the provisions of this act.