CORPORATE EXISTENCE 
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Coad 
of me National Banking Law of 1863 provided that national banks 
should have a corporate existence for the period named in the 
articles of association, but not to exceed twenty years. In the re- 
vision and re-enactment of the law in 1864, the corporate existence 
was fixed at twenty years from the date of organization. By the 
Act of June 12, 1882, the associations were authorized to extend 
their corporate existence for an additional period of twenty years, 
and by the Act of April 12, 1902, for a further period of twenty years. 
In 1922, a number of banks organized in 1863 reached the end of 
their corporate existence. In anticipation of this condition the 
Comptroller, in his Annual Report to Congress in 1921, submitted 
two bills; First, for a third extension of charters for a period of 
twenty years, to be effected as had been the prior extensions, and the 
other to grant to national banking associations perpetual succession. 
The latter bill received favorable consideration by the Committee on 
Banking and Currency of the House of Representatives, and was 
passed by the House. The bill had the unanimously favorable con- 
sideration of the Senate Committee on Banking and Currency, but 
when reported to the Senate was amended, fixing ninety-nine years 
as the period of succession. This amendment being agreed to in 
conference and the House accepting the report of the conferees, the 
bill as submitted was passed, and received Presidential approval on 
July 1, 1922. 
This legislation automatically extended for ninety-nine years the 
period of succession of all banks organized and operating on July 1, 
1922, and granted to all banks organized after that date, succession 
for ninety-nine years from the date of organization. With the passage 
of the Act of February 25, 1927, a national bank has “succession from 
the date of the approval of this Act, or from the date of its organiza- 
tion if organized after such date of approval, until such time as it be 
dissolved by the act of its shareholders owning two-thirds of its stock, 
or until its franchise becomes forfeited by reason of violation of law, 
or until terminated by either a general or a special Act of Congress or 
until its affairs be placed in the hands of a receiver and finally wound 
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