Page:North Dakota Reports (vol. 48).pdf/783

, J. In a mandamus proceeding entitled as above and pending in the district court of Burleigh county, the petitioner seeks to have issued, to cover certain hail losses, a hail warrant, negotiable or assignable in form, payable out of the hail insurance fund, without being subject to pro-rating upon the contingency of the fund being insufficient. It was stipulated in the court below that the plaintiff's right depended upon the answers to two questions:

First, are the hail warrants heretofore issued in the following form negotiable or nonnegotiable:

For Certified Hail Loss Charge 1921 State Hail Insurance Fund

County of

State of North Dakota. Auditor’s Office.

No B

Bismarck,

Pay to the order of

the sum of $

To the State Treasurer Dollars

of North Dakota:

Bismarck D. C. Poindexter, State Auditor

Ralph Madland, Deputy

By.

Second, when the warrant is issued in the above form, is it, in case of the insufficiency of the fund designated, payable ratably out of the funds collected into the hail insurance fund for that year, or is it payable when called in the amount stated on its face with statutory interest?

The trial judge ruled that the warrants, in the form above set forth, are nonnegotiable, and that they are binding obligations of the state payable in full, and not ratably. The above two questions are certified to this court for answer.

It being clear that such warrants are payable only out of the hail insurance fund, they are nonnegotiable. They are nevertheless assignable as ordinary warrants for the payment of money, and are so recognized