per cent of the aggregate amount of its deposits, exclusive of savings deposits and of time deposits represented by certificates or agreements in writing and payable only at a stated time, but whenever such time deposits may be withdrawn within thirty days they shall be subject to the reserve requirements of this act; and every trust company doing business in the city of Boston shall at all times have on hand as a reserve an amount equal to at least twenty per cent of the aggregate amount of its deposits computed in the same manner. In my opinion, this law requiring a reserve does not apply to deposits of the character described in the question. The deposits in question cannot be withdrawn within thirty days, but only thirty days after demand or notice, and therefore come within the terms of the statute which exempts deposits payable at a stated time from the reserve requirement. OFFICIAL BOND SURETY MARRIED WOMAN WIFE OF To the Controller of County Accounts. 1909 November 23. Under the provisions of R. L., c. 153, § 2, that "a married woman may make contracts, oral and written, sealed and unsealed, in the same manner as if she were sole, except that she shall not be authorized hereby to make contracts with her husband," a married woman may, as surety, sign the official bond of her husband. In answer to your communication, dated November 17, in which you inquire whether or not a wife is eligible as surety upon the official bond of her husband, I beg to refer you to the provisions of R. L., c. 153, § 2, which section is as follows: A married woman may make contracts, oral and written, sealed and unsealed, in the same manner as if she were sole, except that she shall not be authorized hereby to make contracts with her husband. This statute "enables a married woman to 'make contracts, oral and written, sealed and unsealed, in the same manner as if she were sole,' and does not require that the consideration of her contracts should enure to her own benefit. The provision that nothing in this act shall authorize her 'to convey property to, or make contracts with, her husband,' is evidently not in tended to impose any new restriction on her capacity, but merely to affirm the rule of the common law, so far as her husband is the other party to her grant or contract; and does not prevent both of them from binding themselves by a joint promise to a third person, within the authority conferred by the statute. Parker v. Kane, 4 Allen, 346." (Major v. Holmes, 124 Mass. 108.) See also Binney v. Globe National Bank, 150 Mass. 574. It follows, therefore, that a married woman may, as surety, sign the official bond of her husband. INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION STATE BOARD OF EDUCATION INDEPENDENT INDUSTRIAL SCHOOLS CITIES AND TOWNS. The provisions in sections 2 and 3 of chapter 505 of the Acts of 1906 for the establishment of independent industrial schools, for the maintenance of which the Commonwealth has in part to reimburse the municipalities by which such schools are established, do not create distinct classes of schools after establishment, but rather prescribe methods by which such schools may be created, and contemplate industrial schools, the establishment of which has been initiated and superintended by the Commission on Industrial Education, or by its successor, the State Board of Education, or has been provided for by the municipality in which such school is located. An independent industrial school, so established, must be in addition to, and not a part of, the public school system of the city or town where such school is located. Board of 1910 You request my opinion upon the question whether or not To the State schools which had been maintained in certain cities as evening Education. schools, in which industrial education had to some extent been January 8. introduced, and which were abandoned by such cities and then established by the Commission on Industrial Education as independent industrial schools, to be carried on in co-operation with the respective cities, are independent industrial schools within the meaning of St. 1906, c. 505, and acts in amendment thereof or addition thereto. St. 1906, c. 505, was inartificially drawn in the first instance, and has been frequently amended without apparent effort to bring such amendments into harmony with the existing pro visions of law. It seems to me, however, that chapter 505 contemplated that the commission should initiate and superintend the establishment of, and the municipalities should provide, industrial schools which should be independent of and in addition to the public or common schools required by law to be established and maintained by the various cities and towns of the Commonwealth, and that the commission should have a general superintendence over the whole field of industrial education, and should have full power with respect to the disbursement of all money, whether appropriated by a municipality or by the Commonwealth, for industrial education. See St. 1908, c. 572. St. 1909, c. 540, amended section 5 of chapter 505 of the Acts of 1906, which now reads as follows: Upon certification by the board of education to the auditor of the commonwealth that a city, town or district, either by moneys raised by local taxation or by moneys donated or contributed, has maintained an independent industrial school, the commonwealth, in order to aid in the maintenance of such schools, shall pay annually from the treasury to such cities, towns or districts a sum equal to one half the sum raised by local taxation for this purpose: provided, that no payment to any city or town shall be made except by special appropriation by the legislature. Chapter 457 of the Acts of 1909 provides for the consolidation of the Board of Education and the Commission on Industrial Education, and there appear to be no provisions in the statute which affect the powers of the Board of Education, as successor to the Commission on Industrial Education, with respect to that branch of its work. After some consideration of the subject, I am of opinion that the independent industrial schools for the maintenance of which the Commonwealth is in part to reimburse the municipalities by which such schools are established, are industrial schools the establishment of which has been initiated and superintended by the commission in the first instance, or by its successor, the State Board of Education, or has been provided for by the municipality in which it is located; and that the provisions of sections 2 and 3 of said chapter 505, with respect to initiating the establishment of and providing for such schools, do not refer to distinct classes of schools after establishment, but to the methods by which independent schools may be set in motion. I am further of opinion that our legislation clearly contemplates a course of instruction and a class of schools in addition to the public school system as established by law in this Commonwealth, and that an independent industrial school cannot be a part of the public school system of any municipality. What was apparently done by the Commission on Industrial Education was to arrange with a municipality that a part of the public school system, in which more or less industrial education had been introduced, should be abandoned by the city and taken over by the commission as an independent industrial school. In no case does it appear that an independent school was established in addition to the educational facilities already maintained in any municipality, but, on the contrary, such municipality discontinued a branch of its public school system, which was then, with some changes in courses of instruction, taken over as an independent school. This, in my opinion, was not the intent of the statute, since in no case was an independent school established. The only effect of the action so taken was to transfer the control and the responsibility for the maintenance of an existing school or educational institution; and where the statute contemplated opportunities in the direction of industrial studies in addition to the educational opportunities offered by the public schools, it results that the industrial courses are offered more or less at the expense of the instruction in the public schools, as such. I am of opinion that this course was not what the statute contemplated when it authorized the commission to initiate and superintend the establishment of industrial schools. If schools such as you describe are independent schools within the meaning of the statute, the cities and towns by which they are maintained may, of course, be reimbursed, and this reimbursement would extend to section 4 of chapter 572 of the Acts of 1908. If they are not, and from the facts presented to me they appear not to be, no reimbursement can be had. To the Bank SAVINGS BANK-NATIONAL BANK OR TRUST COMPANY-CON- A connection between a savings bank having an office upon the second floor of a You ask my opinion as to whether section 19 of chapter 590 of the Acts of 1908 is violated where there is a connection between a savings bank, having an office on the second floor of a building, and a national bank or trust company underneath, occupying the first floor, by means of a dumb-waiter or small lift, sufficiently large for the transportation of money or securities by an opening through the floor, but not large enough for the use of a person. St. 1908, c. 590, § 19, is as follows: No savings bank shall occupy the same office or suite of offices with a national bank, trust company or other bank of discount, nor any office directly connected by means of doors or other openings in partitions with the office or suite of offices used or occupied by any such national bank, trust company or other bank of discount. Any such corporation violating the provisions of this section shall be punished by a fine of not more than five hundred dollars. The law provides that a savings bank shall not have an office directly connected by means of doors or other openings in partitions with the office occupied by a national bank or trust com pany. I am of opinion that in the case described by you there is such a connection, and that the law was intended to, and does, prohibit such connection. I do not see how such an opening can be made in the ceiling of the room, so as to connect the two institutions, if it cannot be made in the sides. I think the word "partition" is broad enough to cover both cases, and such connection is therefore prohibited by the statute. |