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COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE
DECEMBER 9, 1967—10:25 A.M.
PRESIDENT H. VERNON ENEY,
PRESIDING
THE CHAIRMAN: The Committee of the
Whole will please come to order.
The first item for consideration under
General Orders of the Day is Committee
Recommendation EB-2.
The Chair recognizes Delegate Morgan,
the Chairman of the Committee on the
Executive Branch and requests him to come
forward to the reading desk.
While Delegate Morgan is doing that, I
have been asked to call your attention to
some activity that will be taking place on
the State House lawn about 1:00 P.M. You
may be curious or interested. They will be
filming some scenes for a coming television
show to be shown later over WMAR-TV.
They are going to shoot some scenes in
front of the State House for a January 14th
program on Ratification Day. Members of
the Colonial Players, the oldest and most
renown acting troop in this area will be in
colorful costumes to portray early Anna-
politans and Maryland statesmen. There
will be some shooting inside the State
House. This will be about 1:00 P.M. today.
Delegate Morgan.
DELEGATE MORGAN: Mr. Chairman,
last week the Committee of the Whole
voted that there should be an attorney
general provided for in the Constitution. I
believe the Executive Branch Committee
interpreted that vote as meaning that there
should be an elected attorney general pro-
vided for in the Constitution and the report
before him now contains a recommendation
for an elected attorney general.
The Committee has provided that the at-
torney general have substantially the same
duties as he has under the present Con-
stitution. However, the attorney general is
£iven broad additional functions and duties
under the control of the General Assembly.
There was a proposal before the Committee
that the Committee also specifically provide
that the governor could appoint legal coun-
sel and that the General Assembly could
appoint legal counsel. However, the Com-
mittee left that out because it was con-
sidered unnecessary. In the present Con-
stitution, there is a prohibition against the
governor appointing additional legal coun-
sel without the approval of the General
Assembly. However, since that is left out of
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the proposed Constitution, it was thought
that there was no reason why the governor
could not appoint legal counsel and call
him special counsel, general counsel, or
whatever you wish, without any specific
authority for it. That, I believe, Mr. Chair-
man, is the sum and substance of our re-
port and if anybody has any questions, 1
will be glad to answer them. Are there any
questions of the Committee Chairman?
THE CHAIRMAN: Delegate Gallagher.
DELEGATE GALLAGHER: Mr. Chair-
man and Chairman Morgan, if the majority
of the General Assembly were constituted
of a party different from that of the gov-
ernor, might not it be more helpful to the
governor to provide in the Constitution
that there shall be counsel to his office
rather than to allow political differences to
possibly cause the elimination of the statu-
tory office ?
THE CHAIRMAN: Delegate Morgan.
DELEGATE MORGAN: Well, I imagine
if the governor wanted counsel, he would
provide for one in his budget and I cannot
imagine a General Assembly striking out a
counsel for the governor or staff for the
governor. As a matter of fact, the General
.Assembly now is of a different party from
the governor and it has been very coopera-
tive in providing the governor with the
staff assistants that he wants.
T,HE CHAIRMAN: Are there any further
questions?
Delegate Boyles.
DELEGATE BOYLES: Delegate Morgan,
I notice for governor the candidate must be
a qualified voter of the State but for the
attorney general, he must be a registered
citizen. Is there any reason for this? Is
this an inconsistency or does not he have
to be a qualified voter?
That is on line 11. Are the words synon-
ymous ?
THE CHAIRMAN: Delegate Morgan.
DELEGATE MORGAN: To be a member
of the bar of the State, I think, you have to
be a citizen as a matter of fact and I think-
that is just a carry-over from the existing
Constitution.
THE CHAIRMAN: Do you have a further
question, Delegate Boyles?
Are there any further questions?
THE CHAIRMAN: Delegate Boyles.
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