306 THE FARMERS BANK OF MARYLAND'S CASE.

There is nothing in this section which directly relates to the
transfer of the stock of the institution; but it manifests the en-
larged spirit of accommodation in which its affairs were proposed
to be conducted, and the liberal manner in which money might be
obtained from it. Loans were to be made upon reasonable per-
sonal or landed security; and the directors were to be clothed with
ample power to lend upon those terms. Considering this authority
to make loans upon more extended principles, it is obvious, that
according to the spirit of its charter, the institution should not
only be authorized to require reasonable security in the first in-
stance, but that it should also be allowed to lay hold of every just
means of obtaining satisfaction from its litigious or delinquent
debtors. This, I am satisfied, was the true intention and sole
object of this provision of the twentieth section of the act of its
incorporation as set forth in the defendant's answer. It was in-
tended to give to the bank a mortgage or lien on its stock held by
that class of its debtors and nothing more. (5)

If, as is alleged by the answer, the debt must be first paid,
before the body politic can be allowed to transfer any stock so
held; or the president and directors are bound, in behalf of the
company, to retain the stock until the debt is actually and fully
paid, the very end in view, as is demonstrable from this case, may
be defeated; and the debt may never be paid or collected. Here
it is alleged by the administrator, and not denied, that he has not
a sufficiency of assets to pay all; he is not therefore bound to pay
the entire of any one debt; nor indeed is he allowed to apply the
assets in satisfaction of any one debt exclusively; or in any other
manner than in due proportion to all; and consequently, the con-
dition on which alone this stock can be transferred, as the bank
interprets this clause of its charter, never can be complied with.
Or suppose the debtor himself to be living, but insolvent and
utterly destitute of the means of satisfying the claim, then, accord-
ing to the position of these defendants, no transfer could be made,
and the stock standing in the name of the insolvent, with its accu-
mulating dividends, must be locked up for ever, dead and useless
to every one.

Rejecting, therefore, those constructions of this clause which
lead inevitably to the grossest injustice, I consider it as intended
merely to give to the bank an additional security, to the value of

(6) Child v. Hudson's Bay Company, 2 P. Will, 207