Glanton v. . Jacobs

Clark, J.: As was said in Bank v. Gilmer, 116 N. C., 684, 707, “Chapter 453, Acts 1893, is not a mere recommendation from the legislature to insolvents as to the form *428 of assignments and proceedings thereunder, but in its very nature the Act is imperative. If not complied with by the asssignor by filing schedule as required, the assignment is invalid.” This has been cited and approved in Frank v. Heiner, and Bank v. Gilmer, both at this Term. These decisions are sustained by the great weight of authority in other States, the numerous cases being cited in the excellent brief filed by the plaintiff’s counsel. The statute being mandatory it is necessarily so as to time. Mather v. McMillian, 60 Wis., 546, is in point, in which the deed of assignment was held invalid because recorded one day too late. Familiar instances are our own eases in which the service of notices of appeal and cases on appeal, and the like, has been held invalid when not made within the prescribed time. Wade v. City of Newbern, 72 N. C., 498; Taylor v. Brower, 78 N. C., 8; Adams v. Reaves, 74 N. C., 106. The deed of assignment was filed for registration on the 6th of January, 1894. The schedule of preferred debts which is required to be filed within five days after the registration, was not filed till the 12th of January, 1894. “Excluding the first day and including the last” the mode of computation prescribed by The Code, Sec. 596, this was not in time. That section excludes Sunday only when it is the last day of the time limited, so the case would not come within the decision in Barcroft v. Roberts, 92 N. C., 249. If The Code, Sec. 596, applies, as it seems, only to times limited for the services, &c., prescribed by The Code of Civil Procedure, then Sunday, even if it had been the last day would not have been excluded in the computation. Branch v. Railroad, 77 N. C., 347; Keeter v. Railroad, 86 N. C., 346. Nor does it aid the defendant that the register of deeds in point of fact did not register the instrument till the 8th of January, for the filing for registration is in law the registration, and all *429 rights and liabilities accrue from the date of filing and do not depend upon tlie greater or less diligence of the register in performing liis duty. McKinnon v. McLean, 19 N. C., 79; Motts v. Bright, 20 N. C., 258; Parker v. Scott, 64 N. C., 118; Davis v. Whitaker, 114 N. C., 279. No Error.