|
lottery, then that option would not be open
to the court.
DELEGATE SHERBOW: No, and there
would be nothing to stop the General As-
sembly from granting all the lottery per-
mits it wanted.
THE CHAIRMAN: Delegate Grant.
DELEGATE GRANT: In other words, it
is the horns of a dilemma either way.
DELEGATE SHERBOW: I do not think
so, I do not think it is on the horns of a
dilemma, I think if you keep what you
have, that which was worked and served
its purpose and which will avoid the legis-
lature having these problems, I think in the
words of Governor Chaffee this is the kind
of situation that it is bad in a constitution
to change. I think experience shows that is
so. Let it stay in, it is all right.
THE CHAIRMAN: Delegate Sollins.
DELEGATE SOLLINS: Delegate Sher-
bow, by use of this term "political subdi-
visions" in line 10 of your recommendation,
by political subdivision do you mean to in-
clude all the various governmental units as
were defined in the local government ar-
ticle such as intergovernmental authorities,
civil units, et cetera.
DELEGATE SHERBOW: Yes, you see
it is a broad inclusion. Of course, some
would never have such power any way.
THE CHAIRMAN: If there are no fur-
ther questions, the Chair calls on Delegate
Dukes to present the Minority Report.
While Delegate Dukes is coming forward to
do that, I request the Reading Clerk to read
this announcement.
READING CLERK: Announcement by
Delegate Rush and Delegate Caldwell in
behalf of delegates from Baltimore County.
Mr. President, ladies and gentlemen of
the Convention : it is with deep regret that
we announce the death on December 1,
1967, of Howard E. Burkhardt. He was for
many years Supervisor of Assessments for
Baltimore County, in which position he
served the people of Baltimore County with
great distinction. Those of us who knew
him wish to express our deepest sympathy
to his wife and family.
THE CHAIRMAN: Delegate Dukes.
DELEGATE DUKES: Mr. Chairman,
virtuous delegates, fellow sinners, we, the
spokesmen of eagles, salute you. We are
happy to have this opportunity to give you
an opportunity to look into the darkness
|
in which we dwelt. As I peer out over the
rostrum, into the kindly and wise face of
my leader, Chairman Sherbow, and his sa-
gacious colleague, Walker Lewis, we of the
minority are fully aware that the road we
tread toward success against such opposi-
tion is indeed fraught with adversity and
we realize that we will encounter at every
turn both a good deal of scholarship and
learning. We are not unaware we are
much in the role of Don Quixote as he
charged the windmill. No analogy intended,
of course, between the learned opponents
and the windmill. We recognize it is quite
clear that the majority has donned the
white hats and as the official spokesman
of sin, we will have to do the best we can
to convince you that the lottery provision
simply should not be in the constitution.
We ave aware of the adage of Al Capp's
Mammy Yokum that good is better than
bad because it is nicer and we realize that
our opponents follow straight down that
narrow path. Nevertheless we feel it is in-
cumbent upon us to urge you that this
matter, like many others that have come
before this Convention, is not a constitu-
tional matter and that even if it were, it
is not nearly so important as has been
alleged.
I will not trouble you with going at
length through the minority report. It has
been presented to you and I will try to limit
my appeal to about five minutes, if you
will promise to read the minority report
sometime while the majority is talking.
Judge Sherbow has already anticipated
most of the minority report. He has set it
up, and he has decimated it with his ar-
gument, and we will not trouble you with
it again. Fortunately, most of the items
which he covered we did not intend to
cover, anyway.
There are four basic points to our re-
port. The first is that we readily agree
that there is a strong argument that a
lottery or any system of lottery, either con-
trolled by the State or its subdivisions, or
by independent parties will not necessarily
relieve the State and its citizens of the en-
tire tax burden. We do not feel that the
lottery will supplant all the income taxes
and all the sales taxes and all the property
taxes and all the other taxes.
We feel that it may still be necessary,
even if the legislature some day saw fit to
have a lottery that it would have taxes
also. We simply urge to you that it is not
foreclosed that a lottery cannot be a suc-
cessful means of self-finance.
|
