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be the head of the finance department or
of any other principal department of the
executive branch. "
THE CHAIRMAN: The Clerk will now
read Amendment No. 8.
READING CLERK: Amendment No. 8
to Committee Recommendation EB-1, by
Delegates Morgan, Adkins, Beall, Boileau,
Boyce, Buzzell, Dorsey, Finch, Fornos, Har-
ris, James, Mason, Maurer, Powers, Sickles,
A. W. Smith, Storm, Sybert and Tawes:
On page 6 following section 4. 17 insert the
following new section:
"Section 4. Qualifications and Election
of Comptroller
To be eligible for election as comp-
troller, a person shall have attained the
age of thirty years at the time of his
election and shall have been a qualified
voter in the State at least five years im-
mediately preceding his election. The
comptroller shall be elected for a term
of four years by those voters qualified
to vote in State elections. He shall be
elected in the same election at which a
governor is elected. The term of office of
the comptroller shall begin at the same
time as the term of the governor and
shall continue until his successor shall
have qualified. In the event of a vacancy
in the office of comptroller, the governor,
by and with the advice and consent of
the Senate, shall appoint another person
to fill such vacancy who shall serve until
his successor has been elected and duly
qualified. The comptroller shall give such
bond for the faithful performance of his
duties as may be prescribed by law. "
THE CHAIRMAN: Amendment No. 7
having been seconded, the Chair recognizes
Delegate Morgan to speak to the amend-
ment.
DELEGATE MORGAN: Mr. Chairman,
these two amendments provide for an
elected comptroller with limited duties. The
duties that are assigned to the comptroller
are the preaudit functions which he per-
formed at the present time. All of the tax
collecting functions of the present comp-
troller's office, all of the revenue estimating
functions of the comptroller's office, all the
post-audit functions of the comptroller's
office and other functions are not granted
to the elected comptroller by this amend-
ment. Under a subsequent amendment which
I shall propose as the so-called Board of
Public Works amendment, the comptroller
will be the third member of the Board of
Public Works, in other words, the Board of
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Public Works will consist of a governor,
an individual in the executive branch ap-
pointed by the governor and the comptroller.
I am very hopeful that this amendment
will break the log jam which has held up
the proceedings in this Convention for a
considerable period of time. I urge its adop-
tion and hope that it will have a very sub-
stantial vote among the delegates.
THE CHAIRMAN: Delegate Malkus.
DELEGATE MALKUS: Mr. Chairman,
this comes out like a bolt out of the blue.
We certainly have not had an opportunity
to study the subject matter. We know that
there are those here who would like to de-
prive the people of their rights as far as an
elected comptroller is concerned, and I hope
the records will record what I have said
correctly but if we are going to operate in
a manner in which we understand the sub-
ject matter, we need more time to study it.
I might be the only vote, Mr. President,
but I want to know what is going on and
for that reason I move that this motion be
made a special order of business for to-
morrow.
THE CHAIRMAN: The motion is out of
order, Delegate Malkus.
DELEGATE MALKUS: I have been out
of order ever since I have been in this
Convention.
Now, will you tell me for what reason?
THE CHAIRMAN: This is a Committee
of the Whole proceeding under a schedule
adopted by the Convention. It does not have
authority to postpone consideration of the
amendment.
DELEGATE MALKUS: Then I will di-
rect this question to you: Should we buy
this thing without knowing what we are
buying?
I know you are brilliant enough to know
what is in the subject matter because you
have known for hours what is in this thing
but we have not known until the last ten
minutes.
THE CHAIRMAN: I suggest to you,
Delegate Malkus, that last week you de-
sired to offer an amendment to have it sub-
mitted to the Committee of the Whole, and
you objected strenuously to anyone seeing
the amendment in advance. The procedure
we are following is to have the amend-
ments made available to the members at
the time it is being considered.
Delegate Malkus.
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