By the 52nd section all affidavits relating to stamp duties, in all cases not expressly otherwise provided for, are to be made before the Commissioners, or other persons named. Quakers may make an affirmation instead of an oath, 7 & 8 Will. III. c. 34; 9 Geo. IV. c. 32; and 3 & 4 Will. IV. c. 49; and also persons who have been Quakers or Moravians, 1 & 2 Vict. c. 77; and any person alleging conscientious scruples may make an affirmation, 17 & 18 Vict. c. 125, s. 20. Affidavits may be made out of England before British Consuls, who are empowered to do any notarial act the same as a notary public, 6 Geo. IV. c. 87, s. 20. Ambassadors and other British Ministers abroad may also administer oaths and do notarial acts, 18 & 19 Vict. c. 42. The 53rd section subjects persons making false affidavits to the punishment of perjury. The 16th section of the 39 & 40 Geo. III. c. 72, empowers the Commissioners to cancel useless probates and letters of administration, and allow the stamps. Where full duty has been paid upon the first grant the Commissioners are, by section 3 of the 41 Geo. III. c. 86 (and by the 5 & 6 Vict. c. 82, s. 36, Ireland), required to stamp any second or subsequent grant with a free stamp. The official regulations require that all applications for the free stamp for any second or subsequent grant of probate or administration must be made in writing, setting forth particularly the nature and value of the property, and the circumstances which render the further grant necessary. Each application should be accompanied with the original grant of probate or administration, and it must be satisfactorily shown that such grant is duly stamped for the full value of the estate and effects of the deceased. The personal attendance at the Legacy Duty Office of the applicant or his agent is necessary, and the parchment piece, duly filled up, on which the free stamp is to be impressed, must be brought to be marked. Scotland. The ceremony in Scotland, corresponding to probate in England and Ireland, is confirmation. The title to regulate the administration of the movable estate, or executory, upon the death of the owner, falls under the jurisdiction of the Commissary Court. In this Court anyone claiming the office of executor is examined, and, on proof of his right, confirmed whence the whole proceeding is called confirmation. The title of the executor nominate (i.e., appointed by the will) is at once confirmed; this corresponds to the grant of probate in England. The title of any other claimant is preceded by a judgment, adjudging the title to be in that person, called a decree-dative; this corresponds to the English grant of letters of administration. A confirmation of the first description is called confirmation of a testament-testamentary; and of the latter, confirmation of a testament-dative; and the executors, executors nominate and executorsdative. The principal regulations for the management and collection of inventory duty in Scotland, which is the equivalent of probate duty in England and Ireland, are contained in 44 Geo. III. c. 98, s. 23. 23 & 24 Vict. c. 80, ss. 1 to 9; and 43 Vict. c. 14, ss. 9 and 10. By the 44 Geo. III. c. 98, s. 23, all executors are bound to exhibit, upon oath, a full inventory, on penalty of double the value of the stamp duty. By the 48 Geo. III. c. 149, s. 38, the duty is imposed on the inventory, and the executor is bound to give up a full inventory, under a penalty of £20 and double duty. By the 40th section of the same Act, it was necessary that any additional inventory should specify the amount of the effects in former inventories, and the stamp duty was then to be paid according to the total of both, the duty on the former being repaid; this was altered by the 16 & 17 Vict. c. 59, s. 8, whereby the additional inventories were made chargeable only with the additional duty. The practice as to a return of inventory duty on the ground of mistake will be found in the printed regulations, at Chapter IV. The 5 & 6 Vict. c. 79, s. 23, applies to inventory duty. If it is intended that a confirmation shall be valid out of Scotland, it is allowable, by the 21 & 22 Vict. c. 56, s. 9, after the 12th November, 1858, to include in the inventory personal estate in any part of the United Kingdom, provided that the deceased died domiciled in Scotland. If this is done the value of such personal estate situate in England or Ireland respectively is to be separately stated in the inventory; and the inventory impressed with a stamp corresponding to the entire value of the estate and effects included therein, wheresoever situate within the United Kingdom. If, how ever, the confirmation is intended to be produced in the Probate Courts of England or Ireland, so that it may, under the 12th or 13th sections of the last-mentioned Act, have the effect of probate or administration, then, in pursuance of the 15th section, the inventory must include all the personal property in the United Kingdom and the value thereof; and the duty will be chargeable upon the whole of such personal property and the value thereof. By the 14th section of the same Act probates and letters of administration granted by the Courts of Probate in England and Ireland respectively, when produced in the Commissary Court at Edinburgh and certified by the Commissary Clerk, shall, if duly stamped, be of the like force and effect and have the same operation in Scotland as if a confirmation had been granted by the said Court. But a note or memorandum of the domicil of the deceased, signed by the proper officer, must be written thereon. It was decided, in The Goods of Muir (1 Swa. & Tris. 294), by Sir C. Creswell, that this note or memorandum could only be made at the time the probate issues and not afterwards. But in Re Allison (3 Swa. & Tris. 574), a supplemental affidavit was filed and a note of the domicil added to the English probate, in order that the Commissary Court in Scotland might do what was necessary to give it effect in that country. By the 23 & 24 Vict. c. 80, s. 1, money secured on heritable property in Scotland, and money secured by Scottish bonds and other instruments, are made liable to inventory duty. By section 2 the duty and interest thereon are made due to the Crown from the person receiving or intromitting with such money or the interest due thereon. By the 39 & 40 Vict. c. 70, s. 42, an additional inventory may be recorded in Scotland for estate situate in England or Ireland of a person who dies domiciled in Scotland, notwithstanding that it shall not contain any estate of the deceased situate in Scotland, and such additional confirmation, when sealed, shall thereafter have the same force and effect as if the probate or letters of administration had been granted by the Court of Probate where it is sealed. Testamentary dispositions in Scotland were, till recently, subject to a stamp duty; they are now, by the 23 & 24 Vict. c. 15, relieved from that tax, and henceforth no will, testament, testamentary instrument, or disposition mortis causâ shall be chargeable with any stamp duty. Ireland. The principal regulations for the management and collection of probate duty in Ireland are contained in— the 56 Geo. III. c. 56, ss. 115–131; the 5 & 6 Vict. c. 82, ss. 35, 36. The duties imposed by this last Act are those in the Schedule to the 55 Geo. III. c. 184, and were continued by the 11 & 12 Vict. c. 9; the 14 & 15 Vict. c. 18; the 15 & 16 Vict. c. 21; and were made perpetual by the 16 & 17 Vict. c. 59, s. 20; and they are not affected by the recent statute transferring the testamentary jurisdiction of Ecclesiastical Courts in Ireland to the Court of Probate (20 & 21 Vict. c. 79, s. 99). |