Page:Harvard Law Review Volume 9.djvu/425

LOTTERY BONDS. 397 bonds by instalments is especially practised at the present time in BelgitiMy in Aiistro-Hiuigary , and in Switzerland. In Ansttia, the kinds of sale have been strictly regulated by the law of the 30th of June, 1878, and in Hungary by the law of the 5th of June, 1883. In Germany the sale of lottery bonds by instalments {Abzaklungs- geschdft) has been forbidden throughout the Empire by the Imperial law of the i6th of May, 1894. IV. Various and peculiar questions arise in connection with the payment of lottery bonds, and, in order to understand them, it is convenient to distinguish the two following; ist. The payment normally effected. 2d. The payment effected before due. (i) Case of normal payment. — Lottery bonds, in general, are paid gradually. The progressive liquidation is assured by periodic drawings by lot. Certain difficulties, however, occur in the prac- tice, and we will consider some of these briefly: — a. It has happened by some mistake, or for some reason other than fraud, that two or more owners of the same number have come to claim the benefit of the same lot. The party issuing the loan was forced to pay the entire amount of the lot to each of the bearers of the successful number.^ b. It can also happen that the number of a bond be omitted at the time of a drawing, and that the holder proves that the number of his bond has not shared in the drawing. How is it possible to set a value in money on the loss occasioned by this omission ! The holder has perhaps been deprived of a prize. At all events he has lost the chance to win one. By what rules is this chance to be valued? Different ways have been proposed, and the imagi- nation of magistrates and jurists has been exercised on this ques- tion without restraint. Though the remedy appear perhaps empirical, we suggest the following solutions. Repeat the draw- ings in which the number in question was omitted, or give several chances in the following drawings for the benefit of the bondholder who was the sufferer before, by inserting in the wheel several lots containing the number of the omitted bond, etc. (2) Case of ajiticipated payment. — The payment of the bonds usually takes place at the times determined beforehand in the specifications of the loan, in such a way that all the bonds shall be 1 Cour d'Appel de Paris, 2Sth of May, 1853.