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Dec. Sess.
1815.
Insurance.
Instalments
—officers.
Occasional
meetings—
proceedings.
Liability--
suits upon po-
licies.
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. 6. AND BE IT ENACTED, That the said directors
shall have full power and authority to make insurances upon
vessels or merchandise at sea, or going to sea. or upon any
goods, wares, merchandise, freights, or other personal proper-
ty, going or gone by land or water, and to lend money on bot-
tomry or respondentia, and generally to transact and perform
all the business relative to the object aforesaid,
7. AND BE IT ENACTED, And declared, that it shall
not be lawful for the directors at any time after receiving the
first payment as aforesaid, to require or demand from the
stockholders any other or further payments, unless the same
may be necessary to defray and satisfy losses previously sus-
tained by the said corporation; and the directors shall have
power to employ the funds belonging to the corporation in such
manner as they may deem most advantageous to the institution
to appoint each and every year such officers, clerks and ser-
vants under them as shall be necessary, and to allow them
severally an annual salary for their respective services, which
shall be ascertained and fixed by the directors each and every
year immediately alter the election of said directors, and before
the appointment of said officers clerks or servants.
8. AND BE IT ENACTED, That there may be occasion-
al meetings of the board of directors at such times as the presi-
dent, or any three of the directors shall think proper, and in
case of the sickness, or necessary absence of the president, his
place may be supplied by any other director whom the board
of directors may for that purpose appoint, and the directors
shall keep full, fair, and correct entries of their proceedings,
which shall at all times be open to the inspection of the stock-
holders.
9. AND BE IT ENACTED, That the directors may on
the second Monday in November, or at any other time, of each
and every year, declare a dividend of the profits of said compa-
ny, or of so much thereof as shall appear to them advisable,
and the dividend so declared shall be paid to the respective pro-
prietors on demand; but the monies received as premiums on
risks, which shall be undetermined and outstanding, shall not
be considered as part of the profits of the corporation; and in
case of any loss or losses whereby the capital stock of the cor-
poration shall be lessened, no subsequent dividend shall be
made until a sum equal to such diminution, and arising from
the profits of the corporation; shall have been added to the cap-
ital.
10. AND BE IT ENACTED, That if at any time the funds of
the corporation should not be competent to pay and satisfy the
just demands of the assured, that nothing herein contained
shall be construed to discharge the stockholders from being lia-
ble for their respective proportions of said losses, according to
the number of shares they may hold therein, but no stockhold-
er shall be liable for more than his own proportion of losses
as aforesaid, or to answer for the failure or deficiency of oth-
ers, further than as an endorser on their notes, and if judgment
shall or may at any time be rendered against the said corpora-
tion in a suit upon a policy of insurance by them signed, and
no property can be found whereon an execution may be laid to
satisfy the said judgment, then and in such case the plaintiff or
plaintiffs may, and he or they are hereby empowered to file in
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