CHAP. 350.—An ACT to amend and re-enact section 923 of the Code of
Virginia, as amended and re-enacted by an act approved February
16, 1892, as amended and re-enacted by an act approved March 3,
1898, as amended and re-enacted by an act approved December 10,
1908. (H. B. 479.)

Approved March 20, 1916.

1. Be it enacted by the general assembly of Virginia, That
section nine hundred and twenty-three of the Code of Virginia,
as amended and re-enacted by an act approved February six-
teenth, eighteen hundred and ninety-two, as amended and re-
enacted by an act approved March third, eighteen hundred and
ninety-eight, as amended and re-enacted by an act approved
December tenth, nineteen hundred and three, be amended and
re-enacted so as to read as follows:

Sec. 923. Appointment of notaries public; their term and
bonds; removable by the governor for cause; what to vacate
their offices: clerks to inform the governor of vacancies.

The governor shall appoint in and for the separate counties
and cities of the State as many notaries as to him may seem
proper, who shall hold office, for the term of four years, and
who shall exercise the powers and functions of conservators of
the peace, and who shall be removable by the governor at will
for misconduct, incapacity or neglect of official duty; provided,
that in every case where the governor shall remove a notary
public from office, he shall report such action, with his reasons
therefor, to the next session of the general assembly; and he
may appoint the same person to serve for two or more counties
and cities, provided, that notaries in cities and in counties in
which cities or parts thereof are located, shall have authority
to act as such in each of said localities, or for one county and
city. Each notary shall give bond in the circuit court of the
county, or corporation or hustings court of the city, for which
the said notary is appointed, or before the judge of such court
in vacation, or before the clerk thereof, within four months
from the date of said notary’s commission, in a penalty of not
less than five hundred dollars; and the clerk of said court shall
immediately forward a certified copy of said bond to the sec-
retary of the Commonwealth. If any person appointed shall
fail to qualify within four months from the date of his appoint-
ment the clerk of the court shall return his commission to the
secretary of the Commonwealth. The removal of a notary from
the county or corporation in which said notary resides when
appointed, unless said removal be into another county or city
for which said notary may have been appointed, shall be con-
strued as a vacation of said office, and the clerk of said county
or city shall at once inform the governor of the fact, as well as
of all deaths of notaries that may occur. It shall be the duty
of the secretary of the Commonwealth, when a commission is
ordered by the governor, to send the same to the clerk of the
court of the county or city in which the notary public is required
to qualify, to be delivered by him to the notary public after said
notary public has given bond, and taken the oath of office; and
the clerk of the court in which this is done shall be required
forthwith to report the fact to the secretary of the Common-
wealth, who shall be required to keep a book, stating the names
and numbers of notaries public, when appointed and when
qualified.