58                                Laws of Maryland                        [Ch. 48

title "General Assembly", sub-title "Legislative Council", relating
to the membership of the Legislative Council.

Section 1. Be it enacted by the General Assembly of Maryland,
That Section 27 of Article 40 of the Annotated Code of Maryland
(1957 Edition), title "General Assembly", sub-title "Legislative
Council", be and it is hereby repealed and re-enacted, with amend-
ments, and to read as follows:

27. Creation.

There is hereby created a Legislative Council. Said Council shall
be composed of twenty members, as follows:

(1)    From the Senate: The President, the chairman of the finance
committee, the chairman of the judicial proceedings committee, the
floor leader of the minority party and six additional members [, of
whom at least two shall be members of the minority party,] to be
appointed by the President and approved by a majority vote of the
Senate.

(2)    From the House of Delegates: The Speaker, the chairman
of the ways and means committee, the chairman of the judiciary
committee, the floor leader of the minority party and six additional
members [, of whom at least two shall be members of the minority
party,] to be appointed by the Speaker of the House approved by a
majority vote of the House.

Said six appointees from the Senate and six from the House of
Delegates shall be appointed during the [1947] 1959 Session of the
General Assembly and during each regular session thereafter to
serve until the beginning of the next regular session, or appoint-
ment of their successors. As far as possible such appointments shall
be so distributed as to make the Council representative of all sec-
tions of the State and of the relative party membership in each
house. The President of the Senate shall be chairman of the Coun-
cil, and the Speaker of the House shall be vice-chairman. The Direc-
tor of the Department of Legislative Reference shall be the sec-
retary and the director of research of the Council.

(8) Filling vacancies.—Any vacancy occurring in the membership
of the Council other than in the offices of chairman and vice-chair-
man while the General Assembly is not in session shall be filled by
appointment of the President of the Senate from among the mem-
bers of the Senate, if the vacancy is caused by the resignation or
death of a member of the Council from the Senate, and by the Speak-
er of the House of Delegates, if the vacancy is caused by the resigna-
tion or death of a member of the Council from the House of Dele-
gates, the appointments to be made in accordance with the pro-
visions of subsections (1) and (2). If the vacancy in the member-
ship of the Council is caused by the resignation or death of the
chairman or vice-chairman, the vacancy in such membership shall
be filled by the members of the Council from the membership of
the Senate or the House of Delegates, as the case may be. In case
of vacancy in the office of chairman, the vice-chairman shall be-
come chairman and the members of the Council shall elect one of
its members vice-chairman in his stead; and in the case of a vacancy