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would continue that right and guarantee
that right of grand jury in certain in-
stances.
DELEGATE JAMES (presiding) : Dele-
gate Bothe.
DELEGATE BOTHE: Delegate Weide-
meyer, did the Committee on Personal
Rights hear any evidence or find any evi-
dence that there was a need to constitu-
tionize the grand jury system in the State?
DELEGATE WEIDEMEYER: Well, I
do not know that we discussed it. Well, we
did consider that, too, and you were there
at the hearings. We intended that the right,
implied in Article 21 of the Declaration of
Rights, to be indicted by the grand jury in
certain cases be continued and be guaran-
teed.
All we intended is that the right not be
taken away. We had knowledge of the fact
that the rules of the Maryland Court of
Appeals, 708 and 709, had been passed
dealing with this subject, but we know
that the legislature can give one day and
take away the next. We wanted it consti-
tutionally guaranteed.
DELEGATE BOTHE: Delegate Weide-
meyer, I understood you to say that we had
taken away a right to grand jury indict-
ment.
DELEGATE WEIDEMEYER: I did not
say that. I said that we do not have the
provision of Article 21 of the Declaration
of Rights. I said that in our previous Con-
stitution the only thing that we had was
by implication, coming out of Article 21,
which said that the defendant should be
entitled to be presented with a copy of the
indictment. By implication, that meant the
indictment of the grand jury. It also can
be interpreted to mean a copy of the pre-
sentment.
DELEGATE BOTHE: Substitution for
which we made provision that the defend-
ant was not entitled to a copy of the
charge.
DELEGATE WEIDEMEYER: Yes, and
in that we have it by implication, too. But
we did not want to do away with the grand
jury indictment. Getting a copy of the
charge might mean just the state's attor-
ney's charge. We did not want it that way.
We wanted the right of grand jury indict-
ment in certain cases guaranteed.
(At this point, President H. Vernon
Eney resumed the Chair.)
THE CHAIRMAN: Delegate Bothe.
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DELEGATE BOTHE: Again I would
ask for an answer to a question originally
asked and that is whether there was any
evidence before the Personal Rights Com-
mittee which would justify the necessity
for including the right to grand jury in-
dictment in the constitution.
DELEGATE WEIDEMEYER : Yes, there
was, and I think that was on one of the
days when you were out on some due
process work or something, and we had
State's Attorney Charles Moylan and we
had him there at length going over this
matter.
THE CHAIRMAN: Delegate Bothe.
DELEGATE BOTHE: You are aware,
I trust, that a large number of petty of-
fenders who may or may not be charged
with infamous crimes, since that word is
uncertain, are proceeded against by waive
of information in the State?
DELEGATE WEIDEMEYER: The mi-
nor ones are preceded by presentment and
even some of the major crimes are pre-
ceded by presentment, especially when
they waive them.
DELEGATE BOTHE: Have you any
authority for your statement that the
rights, if set out as proposed in section 11,
could be waived by a person accused of
an infamous crime?
DELEGATE WEIDEMEYER: Yes,
under Maryland Rule 709 the waiver can
be had, and I think the procedure here if
without any special statute has been that
they could waive if they wanted to and
they could waive under this. They could
waive jury trial, or a lot of the rights
that they have.
THE CHAIRMAN: Delegate Bothe.
DELEGATE BOTHE: Have you any
authority in support of that contention?
Some rights are waivable, others are
not.
DELEGATE WEIDEMEYER: There
are a lot of rights that we can waive in
this world.
DELEGATE BOTHE: That is your re-
ply?
DELEGATE WEIDEMEYER: I could
waive the right to talk back to my wife
and let her go off in the wrong direction,
but sometimes I talk back to her.
THE CHAIRMAN: Delegate E. J.
Clarke.
DELEGATE E. CLARKE: I suggest
the absence of a quorum.
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