Volume 2 - ElectricCanadian.com

DEVELOPMENT OF CANADIAN BANKING 467conferred on the Association certain important additionalstatutory rights and duties. These were the appointment ofa curator to take charge of the affairs of any bank which mightsuspend payment, and the supervision of the printing, distributionand destruction of the note issues of the banks. In thismanner the influence which the Association had alreadyexercised for the improvement and safeguarding of theCanadian banking system was officially recognized, and thisrecognition and the informal but powerful prestige of its expertopinion have enabled it to exercise a control over thebanks altogether beyond the range of its official duties. Theexperiment of conferring upon it definite legislative powers todeal with certain banking matters proved so successful, thatlater legislation, as will be seen hereafter, enlarged their scope.The apparent elimination, within the past twenty years, ofmany objectionable practices on the part of individual banksmust be attributed largely to the influence wielded by thisimportant body and by the men who have been most prominentin its councils.Apart from the additional powers thus conferred upon theCanadian Bankers' Association, the amendments made to theBank Act by the revision of 1900 1 were not of much importance.Provision was made for the carrying out of an agreement foramalgamation between two banks. The rate of interestpayable on the notes of a suspended bank was reduced from sixto five per cent, per annum. A new return containing a listof all drafts or bills of exchange unpaid for five years wasrequired. Some slight changes were made in the headings ofthe monthly returns, the most important of which served todistinguish the deposits and loans of the banks inside Canadafrom those outside Canada. Some amendments were made tothe pledge sections, one granting the power to lend upon thesecurity of standing timber and the right or license to cut andremove it, and the others principally facilitating the practicalworking of powers already granted. The products of the163-64 Viet., 1900. c. xxvi.