This is an appeal from the Chancery Court of Leake County and is from the action of that court in overruling the motion of the appellants, B. T. Oliphant and others, to docket and dismiss an appeal which had been taken to that court by the appellee, The Carthage Bank, from the action of the State Banking Board in connection with an application of the appellants here for a certificate of authority and necessity issued to them on May 24, 1954, for the incorporation of a new bank at Carthage to be known as The Peoples Bank of Leake County. The appeal here from the chancery court is also from the action of that court in reversing and remanding the cause to the State Banking Board, to be proceeded with in the manner provided by law, after the chancery court had found on the merits of the appeal by The Carthage Bank that the proceedings theretofore taken by the State Banking Board were null and void.
It appears that on November 6, 1953, B. T. Oliphant and several others signed and filed with C. T. Johnson, the State Comptroller of Banks, a petition asking- for a certificate of public convenience and necessity to incorporate a new bank in the Town of Carthage in Leake County, pursuant to the provisions of Section 5160, Code of 1942, as amended by Chap. 203, Laws of 1948, and attached to their petition a copy of the proposed charter
It appears that the appellee here, The Carthage Bank, was not only notified of the meeting of the Banking Board on February 26,1954, and permitted to participate in the hearing but it was also invited to be present at the meeting on March 12, 1954, and permitted to introduce considerable testimony at the hearing. However, the State Banking Board, after hearing oral arguments of attorneys representing the proponents of the new bank and by those representing the opponents thereof, held an executive session on April 23, 1954, in the Wool-folk State Office Building, when and where it appears that it took the following action:
‘ ■ Motion by Mr. McKinney and unanimously adopted in Executive Session April 23, 1954.
“Moved that the present Carthage Bank offer to the Proponents of the new bank 49% of the presently outstanding capital stock of the Carthage Bank at book value as of April 3, 1954.
“If such an agreement is found to be impossible to arrive at, the Banking Board recommends that the applied for charter be granted.
“It is further recommended that final determination be made 30 days from this date.
“April 23, 1954.”
Although the statute, Chap. 203 of the Laws of 1948, under which the State Banking Board was undertaking to operate, specifically provided that after the filing of the application for a certificate for authority and necessity to incorporate a new bank, the Comptroller should
Nor did the Banking Board “render a written opinion and decision, ’ ’ either at the conclusion of the hearing on March 12, 1954, or after hearing oral arguments from both of the attorneys representing the proponents of the new bank and those representing the opponents thereof, which were heard on April 23, 1954, before the Banking Board went into the executive session and adopted the motion set forth in paragraph four of this opinion.
The State Banking Board was at that time proceeding-under the authority of Chap. 203, Laws of 1948, which amended Sec. 5160, Code of 1942, and the second paragraph of which amending act requires that when the State Comptroller has completed the examination and made his investigation, he shall record his findings in writing and shall draw up his recommendations to the Banking Board, and that thereupon he shall call a meeting of the Board in writing to give consideration to his findings and recommendations, after giving notice of the meeting of the Banking Board to the prospective incorporators of the proposed new bank “and to any and all other interested persons and shall extend to them an in
Paragraph four of the amending act provides, among other things, that “After considering the record submitted to it by the State Comptroller and his oral testimony and considering such other information and evidence, either written or oral, which has come before it, the Banking Board shall decide if it has before it sufficient information and evidence upon which it can dispose of the application to form the new bank.” It is further provided therein that “If it is determined that the evidence and information is not sufficient” a date for a future meeting shall be set in order that the State Comptroller and the proponents of the new bank, as well as the opponents thereof, may secure additional information and evidence, after due notice of such meeting to the prospective incorporators and other interested persons. It is then provided that the Board may order the oral testimony given before it to be taken down and transcribed by a stenographer.
The fifth paragraph of the amending act provides, among other things, that “If the Banking Board, or a majority thereqf, shall determine that it has before it sufficient evidence and information upon which to base a decision, then it shall render a written opinion and decision in the matter.”- Of course this provision means that the Banking Boárd shall render a written opinion and decision as to whether or not the public convenience
Under neither Chap. 203, Laws of 1948, nor under any prior statute, was an appeal from a decision of the State Banking Board allowable, but ;an appeál to the chancery court was provided for under House Bill No. 86, Chap. 162, Laws of 1954, approved on May 4, 1954. At that, time nothing had been done .officially by the State Banking Board except to adopt the motion set forth and quoted in full in paragraph, four of this opinion. The adoption of that motion was not a final judgment. It is in the nature of an order or an offer to The Carthage Bank for it to offer the proponents of the new bank 49% of the presently outstanding capital stock of The Carthage Bank at book value as of April 3, 1954. If it is an order, it dealt with a matter over which the State Banking Board had no jurisdiction so as to require The Carthage Bank to offer to the proponents of the new bank 49% of its capital stock at book value or otherwise. If it is deemed to be an offer to The Carthage Bank that in the event it was willing to offer to the proponents of the new bank 49% of the presently outstanding capital stock of The Carthage Bank at book value, then the offer was outstanding when House Bill 86, Chap. 162, Laws of 1954, approved on May 4, 1954, went into effect.
The offer was rejected by the stockholders of The Carthage Bank on May 5, 1954, and the State Banking Board was notified of the rejection of the offer by The Carthage Bank on May 8,1954. The Carthage Bank had been furnished with the copy of the order or offer made by the State Banking Department on April 23, 1954, in order that The Carthage Bank could either accept or reject the proposition of offering to the proponents of the new bank 49% of the outstanding capital stock of The Carthage Bank at book value, thus showing that the State Banking Board considered that those interested in
The adopted motion which is quoted in paragraph four of this opinion was not a final judgment, but was a conditional order or offer which contemplated that unless The Carthage Bank should offer to the proponents of the new bank 49% of the outstanding capital stock of the former at book value, the Banking Board would authorize the charter to be granted, and that the Banking Board was recommending that "final determination be made thirty days from this dale,” that is to say April 23, 1954. If the so-called final judgment left open for final determination thirty days later the question of whether or not the charter for the new bank should be granted, and on May 24, 1954, without further action by the State Banking Board the State Comptroller issued to the proponents of the now bank the certificate of authority and necessity for the incorporation thereof, then it was not a final judgment. This date was twenty days after the Act of May 4, 1954, granting the right to the other interested parties to appeal to the chancery court, had been approved.
The Court is of the opinion that the motion adopted on April 23, 1954, was invalid as being a conditional offer or judgment, first, for the reason that the State Banking Department had no jurisdiction to require The Carthage Bank to offer to the proponents of the new bank 49% of the outstanding capital stock of the former, and to fix the price at book value; and, second, because it left the matter open for final determination thirty days later, the State Banking Department being the only legal entity with authority to make the final determination, and was therefore a conditional
On May 24,1954, when the State Comptroller issued his certificate of public convenience and necessity, The Carthage Bank and four individuals interested in the said bank perfected an appeal to the chancery court from the adopted order, offer or judgment of April 23, 1954, Avhich brought into review the issuance by the State Comptroller of the certificate of convenience and necessity of May 24, 1954, and which certificate Avas issued twenty days after House Bill 86, Chap. 162, Luavs of 1954, had been approved. The chancellor however held on the motion of the proponents of the new bank to docket and dismiss this appeal, together AAdth a subsequent appeal taken from an “order nunc pro tunc,” and the written opinion and decision of the State Banking
The testimony of Mr. O. H. Barnett, local attorney for The Carthage Bank, is undisputed to the effect that he and Mr. Buss M. Johnson, one of the persons interested in The Carthage Bank, went to the office of the State Comptroller in the Woolfolk State Office Building some time prior to June 4, 1954, and requested that they be permitted to see the minutes of the Board as to what action had been taken by it in the proceedings and that they were told by the Comptroller and one of his assistants that no minutes had been written up and that another meeting would be held on June 4, 1954, for the purpose of writing up the minutes; that on June 4, 1954, the witness and one of the interested persons went to the Woolfolk State Office Building to attend the meeting that was to be held by the Banking Board on that
In 49 C. J. S. 246, Sec. 117, as the caption thereof, it is said: ‘ ‘ The object and office of a nunc pro tunc entry of a judgment are to exhibit correctly on the record a judgment previously rendered and not carried into the record or not properly and adequately recorded.”
And then further it is said as a part of the text of Section 117, that: “In connection with judgments, the object or purpose, and office, function, or province, of a nunc pro tunc entry are to make the record speak the truth by recording or correctly evidencing an act done or judgment rendered by the court at a former time and not carried into the record, or not properly or adequately recorded. It is not the object, office, or province of such an entry to alter a judgment actually rendered, or to correct an erroneous decision or judgment; and, generally speaking, the object or office of the entry is only to support matters of evidence or to correct
In the case of Martin v. Newell,
One of the principal arguments made by the appellants here, B. T. Oliphant and others, is that the State Banking Board was acting in its administrative capacity and that it had the right to enter an order nunc pro tunc to cause the former order, offer or judgment of April 23, 1954, to speak the truth by setting forth what the State Banking Board really intended to order when it adopted the motion set forth in paragraph four of this opinion. But it would be difficult for us to find a basis for holding that the State Banking Board did not intend to do what it set forth in its order, offer or judgment of April 23, 1954, as quoted in paragraph four of this opinion, since there was submitted to The Carthage Bank a copy thereof for its acceptance or rejection pending the “final determination” of the matter thirty days after that date, and which offer to The Carthage Bank was still outstanding on May 4,1954, when House Bill No. 86, Chap. 162, Laws of 1954, was passed and which offer was rejected on May 5, 1954, by The Carthage Bank. It would be more difficult to conceive that on April 23, 1954, the State Banking Board then intended to render the written opinion and decision, which, according to the testimony of Judge M. B. Montgomery, was not prepared until during the first days of May 1954, between May 1st and May the 5th, since that opinion found that
It appears that the “order nunc pro tunc” of June 4, 1954, prepared in an effort to rectify the error of the adopted motion of April 23, 1954, may be subject to the
‘ ‘ It appearing unto the Board that heretofore on April 23, 1954, this Board entered upon its minutes the following oi’der:
“ ‘MOVED, that the present Carthage Bank offer to the proponents of the new bank 49% of the presently outstanding capital stock of The Carthage Bank at book value as of April 3, 1954. If such an agreement is found to be impossible to arrive at, the Banking Board recommends that the applied for charter be granted. It is further recommended that final determination be made 30 days from this date (April 23, 1954);’
“And it further appearing unto the Board- that said order does not reflect the decision and the judgment of the Board as actually agreed upon, and should be amended; And it further appearing from the personal knowledge and recollection of each of the members of this Board that said order was entered through inadvertence and mistake and does not speak the truth and is not the order that was actually rendered and annunciated by this Board and does not truly express the findings and decisions of this Board and should be corrected so as to speak the truth, it is adjudged and so ordered that said order of April 23, 1954, and hereinabove set out, be and the same is, hereby corrected so as to read as follows:
“Filed 6/9/54
“W. G. Hamil, Clerk
“It appearing unto the Board that this Board and the Comptroller of Banks have each done and performed all of the acts and deeds in the investigation, hearing and determination of this matter at the time and in the manner required by law and have full jurisdiction to do that herein done, this Board does hereby find as a fact that the Carthage Bank, as presently owned and operated, dotes hot adequately supply the banking needs of the people in Carthage, Leake County, Mississippi, and within the trade area of said bank, but that said Bank would adequately supply said banking needs if 49 % of the stock of said bank were owned by the proponents of the proposed new bank;
“IT IS-THEREFORE ADJUDGED AND SO ORDERED that if the Carthage Bank shall, within thirty (30) days from April 23, 1954, offer to sell and sell to the proponents of the new bank (People’s Bank of Leake County) or any of them 49% of the presently outstanding stock of the Carthage Bank at book value as of April 3, 1954, then the application of the proponents of the new bank for a Certificate of Authority to Incorporate is hereby denied, without further order of this Board, but if the said Carthage Bank shall not within 30 days from April 23, 1954, offer to sell and sell to the proponents of the new bank (People’s Bank of Leake County) or any of them 49% of the presently outstanding stock of the said Carthage Bank at book value as of April 3, 1954, then the application of the proponents of the new bank for a Certificate of Authority to Incorporate is hbreby granted without further order of this Board and the State Comptroller of Banks is ordered to give to such prospective incorporators a Certificate under his hand and official seal of the Department of Bank Supervision authorizing the prospective incorporators to proceed to incorporate and organize as is provided inSection 5157, Title 21, Chapter 2 of the Mississippi Code of 1942 and that this order he entered nunc pro tunc upon the minutes of this Board, and is given effect as of April 23, 1954, in lieu of the order now appearing upon the minutes of this Board under said date of April 23, 1954.
“ADJUDGED AND SO ORDERED, this the...... day of May, 1954.
“(Signed) Cecil F. Travis CHAIRMAN, STATE BANKING BOARD
“ (Signed) W. F. Thompson MEMBER, STATE BANKING BOARD
“ (Signed) C. T. Johnson STATE COMPTROLLER & EX-OFFICIO
“ (Signed) J. M. Harrison MEMBER, STATE BANKING BOARD
“(Signed) W. T. McKinney MEMBER, STATE BANKING BOARD.”
But at any rate it is invalid because it was rendered without notice to the other interested parties.
But it is urged that The Carthage Bank was not entitled to notice of the meeting of June 4, 1954, in order to comply with due process, since the constitutional requirement that no person should be deprived of life, liberty or property is not applicable to corporations except where their property rights are to be affected, and it is contended the said Carthage Bank had no property rights that could be affected by what was to be done on June 4, 1954. The Court is unable to agree with this contention for the reason that The Carthage Bank had the sole right to operate a bank in the Town of Carthage unless and until the requirements of the banking laws were complied with and a valid final judgment was rendered adjudicating that the public convenience and necessity required the establishment of a new bank there, and until the certificate of convenience and necessity had been issued pursuant to a final judgment in that behalf. This right or franchise was a valuable one. entitled
A brief containing eighty typewritten pages has been submitted on behalf of the appellants, and a brief containing one hundred and thirty-one typewritten pages has been submitted on behalf of the appellee, and it would require an opinion of at least one hundred pages in length to discuss and analyze the great number of court decisions and excerpts from the works of textwriters cited in these respective briefs. We deem it unnecessary to thus further prolong this opinion in view of the conclusions that we have reached to the effect, first, that the only judgment attempted to be rendered prior to the passage of the Act of May 4, 1954, was an order, offer or judgment beyond the power of the Banking-Board to render; and, second, because the “order nunc pro tunc” and the written opinion and decision of the Banking Board were rendered at a meeting of which the appellee Carthage Bank had no official notice, and had no notice at all as to where the same- was to be held, or that the “order nunc pro tunc” and the written opinion and decision were to be rendered at such meeting. The Court is of the opinion that both by Chap. 203,
It is well-settled by the decisions of our Court, and in most every other jurisdiction, that when proceedings are in process under a statute and have not been completed, and have not reached the stage of final judgment, and a new act is passed, modifying the statute under which the proceedings were begun, the new statute becomes integrated into and a part of the old statute as fully as if written therein from the very time the old statute was enacted. This is true as to House Bill 86, Chapter 162, Laws of 1954, modifying Chap. 203, Laws of 1948. Some of our cases so holding on the- question are as follows: Deposit Guaranty Bank & Trust Company v. Williams,
On the question of whether or not the appellants had a vested right which the Legislature could not interfere
On the question of the necessity for notice to have been given of. the June 4, 1954, meeting of the State Banking-Board, this Court said in the case of Countiss v. Lee,
And in
As a final referexxce to the motion adopted bj? the Banking Board oxx April 23, 1954, and quoted in paragraph-four of this opiixion, it should be observed that if the courts should approve an action of such board in suggesting or requiring that the stockholders of an existing baxxk should sell to the proponents of a new bank as much as 49% of the capital stock of the former as a conditioxx precedeixt to the denial by the State Banking Board of an application to charter a new bank, the stockholders of the existixig bank would necessarily feel impelled to decline such offer, suggestion or requiremeixt since a compliaxxce therewith would place it in the power of the proponents of a new bank to get control of the affairs of the existing bank as soon as they could acquire from one of the stockholders in the existing bank enough stock, at a price satisfactory to him, to gain such coixtrol. Then, too, the adoption of sxxch a motion as that of April 23, 1954, would inevitably exicourage local citi
The fact that the existing bank in the instant case had submitted to the Board a proposition of compromise involving an increase of its own capital stock, selling a small part of the stock to the proponents of the new bank, and to elect two of them as directors of the existing bank, and in response to which offer of compromise, it is said that the action of April 23, 1954, was taken, does not change the fact that the offer of compromise made by the existing bank prior to April 23, 1954, is a far cry from that which was offered or suggested by the State Banking Board on that date.
We are therefore of the opinion that the action of the chancery court was correct in overruling the motion of the appellees there, who are the appellants here, to docket and dismiss in any event the second appeal; and that the action of that court was correct in holding that the order, offer or judgment of April 23, 1954, was a nullity, and that the order and decision of the State Banking Board on June 4, 1954, were void for having been rendered without notice to the appellee here, The Carthage Bank, which had been given notice and an opportunity to be heard at three previous meetings, and had participated in the proceedings at all times prior to June 4, 1954. We think that the decree of the chancellor reversing and remanding the cause to the State Banking Department without prejudice to the right of the proponents of the new bank and to the right of the State Comptroller and' the State Banking Board to proceed in the manner required by law should be affirmed.
Affirmed.
