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difference between the majority and the
minority report.
It is also a little difficult to discuss this
first amendment without reference to the
one to follow, which I believe includes the
other proposition. This seems to be con-
fined pretty largely to the state institu-
tions of higher learning in the second part
of the amendment.
Delegate Lord has stated in the clearest
and most cogent fashion the objections to
the Majority Report. As I see it, that re-
port attempts to freeze in the constitution
the managerial system as it presently
exists, and also attempts to give inde-
pendence and physical independence to at
least three different state institutions of
higher learning.
That seems to me not only to violate the
constitutional principle that we should have
only three branches of government, but it
also attempts to give complete autonomy
in how funds are expended to what is es-
sentially a branch of the executive govern-
ment.
That seems to me to be very unwise, and
by spending money on one particular proj-
ect, they make it necessary for the legis-
lature to raise money to accomplish some
other purpose.
In short, there are many objects of gov-
ernment concern besides that of education
which have equal demands; and the final
judgment must always rest, it seems to me,
with the legislature.
On the matter of the independence of the
three boards, we know that for years, some
years, there has been a great rivalry be-
tween these boards, and that it is still un-
resolved. Any attempt to solve it would be
defeated by adopting this constitutional
provision, but over and above that, it seems
to me most unwise to attempt to freeze
in the constitution a managerial system
which, whether good or bad, certainly
should be left open to change as the future
may require.
We are in a period of great change, not
only social change, almost amounting to
revolution, but great change in science and
other discoveries which are altering the
face of the earth; and to attempt to cast
the system of education in a fixed mold at
this particular period in history seems to
me to be most unwise.
This is one field where the maximum
flexibility should exist, and it seems to me
that the Minority Report has met that
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problem in the wisest way, by stating gen-
erally the policies and objects of the con-
stitution, but leaving the ultimate solution
of those problems to the representatives of
all the people.
THE CHAIRMAN: Delegate Wheatley.
DELEGATE WHEATLEY: Mr. Chair-
man, this time I yield six minutes to Dele-
gate Kathleen Robie.
THE CHAIRMAN: Delegate Kathleen
Robie.
DELEGATE ROBIE: Mr. Chairman, no
one here will say that we are against edu-
cation. That would be like saying as we
have so many times, we are for sin but
against motherhood. I have heard some peo-
ple say they are not for so much mother-
hood, and birth control should not only be
made mandatory, but retroactive; but since
we have this motherhood and motherhood
produces children, we are going to have to
educate them. Besides being a mother, and
a grandmother of seven, I am also one of
the seven members of the State Board of
Education, and before you discount every-
thing I say as coming from "The Establish-
ment", let me tell you that I have formed
my opinions on education after twenty-five
years of grass roots digging for improve-
ment in the schools of our State.
I have served as the State President of
the homemakers, and then as State Presi-
dent of the Maryland PTA. In these volun-
tary jobs, I have made my first trips to
Annapolis, urging the legislature to sup-
port school appropriations; and we were
able to get Governor Tawes as a staunch
ally. When a vacancy occurred on the
State Board of Education, he asked me to
serve.
During the same time I have been the
program service chairman of the National
Congress of Parents and Teachers, the
largest volunteer organization in the world,
and a director at large of the National As-
sociation of State Boards of Education. I
tell you this only because I have been out
digging to try to find those new explosive
ideas, and I visited schools all over the
United States and in several countries in
Europe and had a wonderful opportunity
to compare Maryland's education system
with that of other states.
But I would be the last one in the world
to ask that any one program or method be
frozen into education.
The basic concept that has made a dif-
ference in European education and in ours
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