6746. Northrup Banking Company (Kansas City, KS)

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# BANK RECEIVERSHIP. Effort Being Made to Make Them Short and Less Expensive. The state bank commissioner has delivered to the attorney general a list of banks that have been placed in the hands of receivers since the creation of the banking law in 1893. The list includes 62 banks and so far as the bank commissioner has been informed, 50 of them are still in the hands of receivers and it is the purpose of Attorney General Godard to investigate the present condition of the receiverships and to require the receivers to show cause why they have not closed up their trusts and distributed the assets among the creditors. Attorney General Godard is opposed to the expense of long receiverships. He believes that with industry and good business methods receiverships in this day of prosperity and debt paying ought to be wound up speedily. It has been the custom of attorney generals heretofore to neglect this important duty to the depositors of liquidating banks and in consequence the receivers and their paid attorneys have by long delay not only consumed the assets largely, but have kept the funds on deposit in favorite banks and drawn the interest as their personal perquisite. Among the banks that have settled with the creditors and gone out of liquidation are: The Banks of Greensburg, the Bank of Hutchinson; the Northrup Banking Co., of Kansas City, the Pawnee County bank of Larned, B. F. Harpster's bank at Severance, C. H. Sawyer's bank of Scottsville, and the Leon Exchange bank. Of the Bank of Ness City, G. A. Borthwick, receiver, the bank commissioner in his letter to the attorney general, makes this interesting comment: "This receivership is in a peculiar condition. Mr. Borthwick was the cashier and principal owner of the bank. At the time the bank was closed the assets would not have paid 25 cents on the dollar, but Mr. Borthwick is engaged in the milling business and has been doing a profitable business and has applied every dollar of his earnings to the settlement of these claims. The court has permitted him to proceed in his own manner and as a result he is gradually paying off the entire indebtedness of the bank, and, in my judgment, will in time settle every dollar of the indebtedness."