110

POSTAL  SAVINGS

lations  for  the  guidance  of  banks  qualifying  as
depositories  of  postal  savings  funds.’’  The  regulations ­
  provided  that  “any  solvent  bank,  whether
organized  under  national  or  State  laws,  .  .  .
subject  to  national  or  State  supervision  and  examination” ­
  might  lawfully  qualify  as  a  depository. ­
  According  to  Director  Weed,  this  authorization ­
  was  limited  to  incorporated  banks  or
“banks  that  are  clothed  with  the  essential  attributes ­
  of  corporations  by  virtue  of  legislative  action.” ­
 6  Private  banks  were  all  excluded,  except
a  certain  class  in  Indiana  which  met  the  requirements ­
  as  to  “organization,  supervision  and  examination.” ­
  Branch  banks  were  excluded  which
did  not  have  apportioned  to  them  by  the  parent
bank  a  specified  amount  of  capital.  In  a  number
of  states,  state  banks  which  could  have  qualified
under  Federal  law  were  prevented  from  doing  so
by  state  law,  but  this  was  later  remedied  in  most
jurisdictions. 7
In  order  to  qualify  as  depositories  banks  were
0  Com.  &  Fin.  Chron.,  A.  B.  A.  Conv.  Suppl.,  1912,  p.  192.
7  State  banks  were  originally  disqualified  in  Arkansas,
California,  Kentucky,  Massachusetts,  Michigan,  Mississippi,
South  Dakota,  Tennessee  and  Wisconsin.  By  1916,  however, ­
  state  institutions  in  all  of  these  states  except  Arkansas ­
  and  Mississippi  had  qualified  as  postal  savings
depositories.  Cf.  Theodore  L.  Weed,  The  Postal  Savings ­
  Banks  and  the  United  States,  in  Com.  &  Fin.  Chron.,
A..  B.  A.  Conv.  Suppl.,  Sept.  21,  1912,  p.  192;  and  Ann.
Rep.  3  Assist.  Postmast.-Gen.,  1916,  p.  S3.