3568

JOINT RESOLUTIONS

Baltimore, Maryland 21201; the Honorable Robert C. Murphy, Chief
Judge of the Court of Appeals of Maryland, Court of Appeals
Building, Annapolis, Maryland 21401; and William S. Ratchford II,
Director of the Department of Fiscal Services, 301 West Preston
Street, Baltimore, Maryland 21201.

Signed May 13, 1986.

No. 30

(House Joint Resolution No. 59)

A House Joint Resolution concerning

Requiring Congressional Votes to be Public and Recorded

FOR the purpose of petitioning the House of Representatives of
the United States and the Senate of the United States to
reform their Rules by providing that all votes on final
passage of legislation be recorded for public scrutiny and
accountability.

WHEREAS, 1987 is the Bicentennial of the Constitution of the
United States, a Constitution which established, for the first
time, a large democratic republic in which the persons charged
with making decisions on behalf of all the citizens are held
accountable by those citizens regularly in elections; and

WHEREAS, In our democratic republic, it is essential that
laws be voted upon in public, with the votes of the
representatives of the people cast and recorded publicly, so that
the voters may know how their representatives vote; and

WHEREAS, The General Assembly of Maryland, in the Rules of
the Senate of Maryland and Rules of the House of Delegates,
requires that votes on final passage of all legislation, both in
the Standing Committees and on the Floors of the two Houses, be
cast in public and be recorded for public scrutiny and
accountability; and

WHEREAS, The Senate and House of Representatives of the
United States of America can, and regularly do, enact into law
legislation seriously and permanently affecting the incomes,
activities, and very lives of millions of citizens, and the
defense of the entire nation, without casting a recorded vote;
and

WHEREAS, The House of Representatives, on December 18, 1985,
did pass the so-called Tax Reform Act of 1985, a bill changing
the tax obligations of all citizens, and changing provisions
affecting millions of dollars, on the basis of a voice vote, with
no recorded vote requested or cast; now, therefore, be it