vi Letter of Transmittal.
At the opening of the Session which met May 9th, 1749, the Governor

congratulated the Assembly upon the restoration of peace, and upon the bene-
ficial effects on the trade of the province of the recently enacted tobacco
inspection law. An acrimonious dispute between the Governor and the Lower
House in regard to the method of election of its clerk, arose immediately after
the Assembly convened, and the Governor promptly prorogued the Assembly.
The question at issue was whether the formal approval by the Governor of the
choice of the Lower House of its clerk, as had been the custom, was a necessary
preliminary to his assumption of that office. The qualifications of Michael
Macnemara, who had previously served in this capacity, were not at issue, as
there was no question as to his fitness. After several conferences the majority
of the members of the Lower House yielded to the Governor, who called the
General Assembly together in session again a few days later; the abortive
meeting of the Assembly, which had lasted but three days, being styled in the
records not a session but a convention of the Assembly. Macnemara was at
once chosen clerk, his selection was approved by Ogle, and he was promptly
sworn in.

Election abuses engaged much of the attention of this Assembly. The Lower
House refused to seat the delegates from Cecil County because a member of
the Upper House was alleged to have " intermeddled " in favor of their elec-
tion, and a new election was ordered. The Lower House concurred in the
report of its Committee on Elections and Privileges, deploring the fact that
candidates for election to the Assembly in certain counties " not only at the
immediate Time of such Election but a long Time before, both by themselves
and their Agents ..... give uncommon Entertainments and great Quantities of
strong and spirituous Liquors to the Electors of such Counties, thereby engaging
the Promises of the weaker Sort of the said Electors to Vote for them ... to
the destruction of the Health, Strength, Peace and Quiet, and to the Corruption
of the Morals of his Majesty's loyal Subjects." The Lower House by a vote
of thirty-one to fifteen passed a bill to prevent persons holding other " Offices
and Places of Profit and Trust " from sitting in the Assembly, but it was
rejected by the Upper House. The great majority of laws passed at this Session
were unimportant and local in character.

The Session which met May 8, 1750, accomplished little. The Lower House
passed resolutions condemning the allowance of double pay to members of the
Assembly, who on the same day attended a session of this body and served as
magistrates, and also protested against double pay for members of the Upper
House who on the same day sat in that body and as judges of the Court of
Appeals. The Lower House passed a resolution by a vote of thirty-four to