Delaware General Assembly

CHAPTER 187

OF INSOLVENCY.

AN ACT to require trustees in voluntary assignment for the benefit of creditors, to give bond with security for the faithful execution of the trust, and for other purposes.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the State of Delaware in General Assembly met,

SECTION 1. That in every case in which any person shall make a voluntary assignment of his or her estate, real or personal, or of any part thereof to any other person or persons in trust for his creditors or some of them, it shall be the duty of the assignee or assignees, within thirty days after the execution thereof, to file in the office of register in chancery of the county in which the real and personal estate of the assignor is situate, an inventory or schedule of the estate or effect[s] so assigned, accompanied with an affidavit by such assignees, that the same is a full and complete inventory of all such estate and effects, so far as the same has come to their knowledge.

SECTION 2. The Chancellor shall appoint two disinterested and competent persons to appraise the estate so assigned, who shall, after being duly sworn or affirmed by some person having authority to administer oaths, to perform their duties with fidelity, forthwith proceed to make an appraisement of the estates and effects assigned, according to the best of their judgment, and having completed the same, shall return the inventory and appraisement to the office of register in chancery of the county in which the inventory of the assignee and the affidavit accompanying the same were filed. The appraisers shall receive the same compensation as is now allowed by law to appraisers of the estate of a decedent.

SECTION 3. The assignee or assignees aforesaid, shall, as soon as such inventory and appraisement shall have been filed, give a bond or bonds with at least two sufficient sureties, to be approved by the chancellor, in double the amount of the appraised value of the estate so assigned. The bond so to be given, shall be taken in the name of the State of Delaware, and the condition thereof shall be as follows, to wit : The condition of this obligation is such, that if the above bounden assignees of shall in all things comply with the provisions of this act, and shall faithfully execute the trust confided to them, then the above obligation to be void, otherwise to remain in full force and virtue. To the said bond there shall be subjoined a warrant of attorney to confess gamey. judgment thereon, and the said bond and warrant shall be joint and several, and such bond shall be filed in the office of the register in chancery of the county in which the inventory and appraisement aforesaid were filed, and shall inure to the use of all persons interested in the property assigned.

SECTION 4. Upon the application of any person interested, when, the chancellor may, at chambers, and as well in vacation as in term, direct said bond to be proceeded on if he deems it necessary and proper for the protection of such interested party or parties.

SECTION 5. The assignee or assignees shall render an account of his or their trusteeship, every year from the date of his or their bond, required to be given as aforesaid, before chancery. the register in chancery of the proper county, until the trusteeship be closed and a final account rendered and approved. If he or they fail to perform this duty, the register in chancery may issue a citation to such assignee, requiring him to appear and exhibit under oath or affirmation, the accounts of the trusts, within a certain time to be named in such citation. Any person interested, may file exceptions to said accounts within one year from the date of the same, in the office of register in chancery in and for the proper county, to be heard, determined, and adjusted before the chancellor, either in term time, or vacation, as he may order or direct.

SECTION 6. The chancellor, upon cause being shown, may remove such assignee or trustee, and compel an assignment of the trust estate to others appointed in their stead. Any order by the chancellor in the premises, may be enforced by attachment and imprisonment.

SECTION 7. That in voluntary assignment heretofore made, the assignee or trustee shall render accounts of his trustee- before passage of ship, according to the provisions of this act, and shall be subject to removal by the chancellor upon cause being shown.

Passed at Dover, Mary 18, 1875.