term of office, and therefore shall vote "aye"
on this proposition. But if it is voted down
I shall then submit an amendment to make
the term six years; thinking the reason "will
apply with more force to six years than to
ten years. If you elect a good judge you can
re-elect him. If you elect a bad judge you
can get rid of him. I vote "aye" on this
proposition.
The question recurred upon the amendment
of Mr. HEBB.
Mr. THRUSTON moved to amend the amend-
ment by striking out "ten" and inserting
"six."
Mr. STIRLING. I shall vote for that amend-
ment. If it is rejected, then I shall move to
insert "five "years. My opinion is that we
should adopt the one extreme or the other.—
If we are not to have a permanent tenure,
then let us have a short one, so that we can
put bad men out if they happen to get in.—
We can induce a good man to take the office
for six or five years, for if he should not be
re-elected he can return to his practice. But
ten years will be just enough to ruin his
practice.
The question was upon the amendment of
Mr. THRUSTON to the amendment of Mr. HEBB,
to strike out " ten " and insert " six."
Upon this question Mr. CHAMBERS called for
the yeas and nays, and they were ordered.
The question being then taken, by yeas and
nays, it resulted—yeas 11, nays 53—as fol-
lows:
Yeas—Messrs. Annan, Carter, Cushing,
Hodson, Keefer, Miller, Robinette, Stirling,
Thruston, Turner, Wickard—11.
Nays—Messrs.. Goldsborough, President ;
Abbott, Berry, of Prince George's, Billingsley,
Blackiston, Bond, Briscoe, Brown, Chambers,
Cunningham, Daniel, Dellinger, Dent, Du-
vall, Edelen, Farrow, Gale, Galloway, Hatch,
Hebb, Hoffman, Hollyday, Hopkins, Hopper,
Horsey, Johnson, Jones, of Cecil, Kennard,
Larsh, Lee, Mayhugh, McComas, Mitchell,
Morgan, Mullikin, Murray, Negley, Nyman,
Parker, Parran, Pugh, Purnell, Ridgely,
Russell, Schley, Smith, of Carroll, Smith, of
Worcester, Sneary, Stockbridge, Swope,
Sykes, Thomas, Valliant, Wooden—53.
The amendment to the amendment was
accordingly rejected.
Mr. PUGH, when his name was called, said :
I act upon principle, and try to get what I
think is about right. After failing in that I
am perfectly willing to take the best I can get.
In the first place I tried to get a long tenure.
Since I cannot get that I shall certainly vote
"no" on this proposition.
The question again recurred upon the
amendment of Mr. HEBB.
Mr. NEGLEY moved to amend the amend-
ment by striking out the words "ten years
from the time of his election, or until he shall
have attained the age of seventy years, which-
ever may first happen, and be re-eligible |
thereto until he shall have attained the age of
seventy years, and not after," and insert " fif-
teen years, and be ineligible for re-election."
Mr. BERRY, of Prince George's. There
seems to be a diversity of opinion upon this
subject. Every member of the convention
seems to have his own peculiar ideas as to the
proper tenure for the office of judge, how
judges should be elected, and everything per-
taining to that matter, I think we halve voted'
upon a sufficient number of propositions now
to indicate tire sense of the convention upon
those subjects. I therefore move that the
whole report be referred back to the judiciary
committee, with instructions to so amend the
report as to meet the views of the convention,
and to report by Tuesday next.
Mr. STIRLING. We. spent two hoars last
night upon a similar proposition.
The PRESIDENT. The motion of the gentle-
man from Prince George's (Mr. Berry) cannot
be entertained now without a suspension of
the rules.
Mr. BERRY, of Prince George's. Then 1
move that the rules be suspended, in order to
enable me to submit the motion to refer.
The question being taken, the motion to sus-
pend the rules was not agreed to.
The question recurred upon the amend-
ment of Mr. NEGLEY to the amendment of
Mr. HEBB.
Mr. THRUSTON called for a division of the
amendment to the amendment, which was
ordered. '
The first question was stated to be upon
inserting the words "fifteen years," instead
of " ten years."
Mr. POOH. There seems to be a prevailing
impression upon the minds of the majority of
this convention, that we shall have an elect-
ive judiciary. To that I have no objection.
But I think that the views of their constitu-
ents are not fully met by the adoption of that
system by the convention. I do know that
there are a great many people in the State of
Maryland, and I know that all of the con-
stituents whom I in part represent, with
whom I have conversed, are in favor of the
appointive system, for the reason that they
think they can in that way better preserve
the purity of the judiciary. It is with them,
as it is with me, a very important matter to
keep the judiciary as pure as possible. It is
with them, as it is with me, a matter of con-
viction that one of the means by which the
judiciary can be kept pure, is the extending
their tenure, and removing them to that ex-
tent from the influences of political consider-
ations.
Now I put the matter to gentlemen who
have secured the elective system for their con-
stituents, whether they cannot at least meet
us half way upon this question, and extend
the tenure of office to fifteen years. There
can be no objection urged to that upon the
ground that it is proper tor the people to elect |
