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local government section 7.01, which said
that "For the purposes of this Constitution
county shall include Baltimore City."
The feeling is that the real issue or only
issue here is that county elections would
now be separated. The majority feeling, as
far as the Committee is concerned, is
simply this, that separating county elec-
tions so that county officials would run
separately would mean greater visibility in
those elections. Those elections would be
indicative of a vote on local issues and it
separates the issues so that a candidate is
accepted or rejected on the basis of his
position or record on local issues.
We feel that while evidence has been
established that the turnout for local elec-
tions in Baltimore City is lower than that
in elections for the state offices or for the
president, we feel that this is not an indi-
cation of a more informed electorate. We
feel that by separating the issues and sepa-
rating the candidates and their positions
on the issues, we would be able to present
a more informed electorate that would go
to the polls and make a decision.
Another reason for separating the county
elections which would, of course, include
Baltimore City, is that candidates would be
accepted or rejected on the basis of what
they could do as far as issues are con-
cerned and they would not be held respon-
sible for that aspect or that part of an
issue that they could have no control over.
It certainly is true that there is an over-
lap of issues on the state and county level.
There is an overlap of issues on the fed-
eral and county level in some cases. But
the county officials would be held respon-
sible for what they could do with regard
to that problem.
If they were to run with a president or
if they were to run with the governor, they
in campaigning would be held responsible
for the governor's responsibility on issues
or the president's responsibility on issues
that might overlap into the local area.
We feel that the main thrust of this
particular section of our article is to pro-
vide greater visibility which would then
provide greater responsibility on the part
of the elected official. It would separate
issues so that the vote would be a clear
indication of countywide issues and not
statewide issues or federal issues.
Another reason for the majority position
on this particular point is that this would
shorten the ballot. We certainly have elimi-
nated in this constitution certain offices.
But we have retained a great many offices.
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We are going to have an elected judiciary.
It would seem to me if it is going to run
every eight years, there might be great
mechanical and administrative problems as
far as the ballot is concerned because the
cost of voting machines is a very important
one. There comes a time with a lot of ques-
tions and issues, bond issues, referenda,
and so on, when there might be a real ques-
tion concerning places on the ballot, how
much room there would be on the ballot.
Also as was made abundantly clear during the very lengthy and exhaustive debate
on the judicial article, there was a great
fear on the part of the supporters of the
judicial article, those that supported the
position of noncompetitive elections, that
in a competitive election a judge would find
himself so far down on the ballot that the
ability of any one group to focus attention
upon his particular stand on issues that
would pertain to his particular office
would be very difficult and with the short-
ened ballot, this, of course, would be made
much easier. The third and major reason
the Committee supports this position is
that it is a rejection of the coattail effect.
It has been traditional where you have
local officials running with either state-
wide officials or with presidential officials
to set up a ticket, where people low on
the ticket will run with the hope of estab-
lishing some kind of coattail effect. I think
those people who are elected at the top of
any ticket, whether they be governor or
president of the United States, are not
elected on the same issues that a county
executive is elected on or that a member
of the county council is elected on. Nor do
I think they should be. This whole ques-
tion of coattail effect reminds me of what
some politicians call Shorenstein's Rule.
Some may be familiar with Shorenstein's
Rule. It seems Shorenstein was a political
boss who was a power in Brooklyn during
the time of Franklin Roosevelt in the
1930's. Shorenstein was a Democrat and
had a very powerful organization and one
of those years when his organization was,
of course, supporting the top of the ticket,
Franklin Roosevelt, he had on his ticket, a
man running for judge. Well into the cam-
paign the judge came to Shorenstein and
said, look, what is all the problem here,
what is going on? All I see in all the ad-
vertisements, all the billboards, all bro-
chures, and all the publicity, the only thing
I see is Franklin Roosevelt. Where am I?
I never see that. Where are my brochures,
where are my billboards, where is my cam-
paign money, how am I going to get elected
when all you are doing is highlighting
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