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Pages will please distribute Amendment
B, B for Baker. This will be Amendment
No. 2.
The Clerk will read the amendment.
READING CLERK: Amendment No. 3
to Committee Recommendation SF-4, by
Delegate Grumbacher: On page 2 section
ti.Ol, State Indebtedness, strike out the last
sentence beginning with the word "All" in
line 10 and extending through the word
"house." in line 17.
THE CHAIRMAN: The amendment has
been submitted by Delegate Grumbacher.
Is there a second?
(Whereupon, the motion was seconded.}
THE CHAIRMAN: The amendment hav-
ing been seconded the Chair calls on Dele-
gate Grumbacher.
DELEGATE GRUMBACHER: Mr.
Chairman, members of the Committee, I
will make my presentation as brief as Dele-
gate Mentzer's, but I hope not end up the
same way.
This amendment deletes the section which
puts a limitation upon the years that the
legislature can authorize debt. The problem
that has faced me in listening to the
debated has been that rather consistently
people have talked about the legislature do-
ing this. It is really the legislature and the
governor who will set the pattern of debt
for this State, not the legislature alone.
With the increasing sophistication of
both the Governor and his fiscal authorities
and the legislature and their advisors, I
think the doubts and worries we have about
them going down the garden path are not
really worth worrying about.
The advantage to extending the debt, a
major one, is that the counties could do for
themselves, could use the State's credit for
such things as water and sewer systems,
25 years is not enough for them in many
cases.
I would like to join the majority and the
minority on this last thing in selective
quotation, selective citation. From Moody's
Investors Services, credit status involves
consideration of a much larger number of
factors and, of course, depends even more
on what the government does than on what
it may be empowered to do. Students of
government have seen any number of in-
g-enious methods of financing which were
not envisioned by drafters of constitutions.
From another organization who asked it
not be named, who does a great deal of
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work in this field, and is nationally known
for it, it says that the present limitations
under readily conceivable circumstances
could become unduly restrictive and then
elicit a remedial action which could be
detrimental.
Facts are very difficult to come by. We
hear opinions consistently, continuously on
these subjects. However, in comparing the
restrictiveness of constitutions to the rat-
ings held by the various states I have
found that there is almost no correlation
among these states which have double A
and triple A ratings. Those which have the
lower ratings have a substantial tendency
toward more restrictive constitutions. In
other words, the moment you become more
restrictive you are asking the legislature
and the governor to hunt for different ways
and more costly ways to finance the gov-
ernment.
We do not know what the future financ-
ing pattern will be in this country, we do
not know how money will be raised in the
future for any great length of time. Let us
instead give some flexibility, some real flex-
ibility to the governor and the legislature
in setting our own financial pattern.
THE CHAIRMAN: Delegate Sherbow.
DELEGATE SHERBOW: Mr. Chair-
man, ladies and gentlemen of the Commit-
tee, I hope you will vote against this
amendment. This provides no restriction
whatsoever. It is open end. There is no
maturity limitation. It is against every-
thing that Maryland has ever stood for in
the way of fiscal responsibility. I hope you
will vote no.
THE CHAIRMAN: Is there any further
discussion?
(There was no response.)
Are you ready for the question?
(Call for the question.)
The Clerk will ring the quorum bell.
The question arises on the adoption of
Amendment No. 3. A vote Aye is a vote in
favor of the amendment. A vote No, a vote
against.
Cast your vote.
Has every delegate voted? Does any dele-
gate desire to change his vote?
(There was no response.)
The Clerk will record the vote.
There being 17 votes in the affirmative
and 79 in the negative, the motion is lost
and the amendment is rejected.
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