The period since 1929 has been one of unusual stress upon securities desirable for the investment of trust funds. Certain specifications set out in state legal lists, as, for example, dividend requirements for railroads, proved unduly restrictive in the light of prevailing business conditions. On the other hand, other types of securities were found to have too few criteria to assure reasonable safety. This was especially true of municipal obligations. These conditions, coupled with the synchronous increase in the volume of trust funds seeking investment,1 shrinkage of the mortgage market, and lowered returns on government obligations, combined to produce a need for the expansion of legal lists. The result has been the enactment in virtually every state of some legislation relating to trust fund investments. Prior to I930 sixteen states expressly authorized investment in securities other than government and municipal obligations and mortgages.2 Since then the six states of Alabama, Florida, Indiana, Nebraska, Pennsylvania, and Tennessee have extended their lists beyond these three categories. In one state, Pennsylvania, a constitutional amendment was required to make this extension possible.2? Of those states which had comprehensive lists before I930, Connecticut, Delaware, Kentucky, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Oregon, Virginia, and Wisconsin have made significant changes. With the enactment by Congress of legislation to combat the depression during the years following 1930o virtually every state passed laws authorizing trustees to avail themselves of the investment opportunities offered by the newly-created federal agencies. The purpose of this article is to collate the resulting mass of statutory material; not to evaluate it but to make possible its evaluation and the discernment of trends by those skilled in this field. The treatment follows a classification by type of security rather than by states. The securities will be discussed in the following order: (i) issues of the federal government and its agencies, (2) foreign, state, and municipal issues, (3) railroads, (4) public utilities, (5) other corporate issues, (6) mort-