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THE PRESIDENT: Delegate Jett.
DELEGATE JETT: Mr. President, and
fellow delegates: I wish to speak in favor
of reconsideration, because this item is an
item that is too important to vote on
lightly.
Regardless of all of our feelings as to the
consumer — and we are all consumers — this
is something to affect every man, woman
and child in this State, and in every walk
of life.
I further want you to reflect on the fact
that I think this is an unwarranted
reflection on the thousands of honest mer-
chants in this State, and the millions of in-
telligent consumers in this State. We are
not infested with a bunch of crooked mer-
chants, and we are not a state inhabitated
by subversives.
This provision makes you stop and ask:
What is unfair ? What is harmful ? Are we
attacking the profit motive? Is the amount
of profit unfair?
In trying to ask the public what have
we done for you, I say to you very sincerely
if we put .this type of thing into the consti-
tution we will have done nothing for the
public but have given them a terrific head-
ache as to what on earth this could possibly
mean in terms of any kind of protection
that the legislature or anyone else could
provide for.
I ask you very sincerely to vote for
reconsideration.
THE PRESIDENT: Delegate Sickles.
DELEGATE SICKLES: Mr. President
and fellow delegates: I strongly urge that
you vote against reconsidering this matter
that we have twice passed in this Conven-
tion. I think that there is no question but
that there is no mischief that results from
this particular provision.
There is no question but that it does
not have any impact or effect until the leg-
islature does pass appropriate legislation,
but I think we ought to understand that
this has been one area where there has
been much discussion but not much action
on the national or, in many of the states,
on the state level, and there is a reason for
it, because there is a basic thrust that we
are concerned with.
I think most of us lawyers know and
others too, the adage: "Let the buyer be-
ware." What has happened in our society
as it has become more complex is .that this
is an adage that we cannot live with exclu-
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sively, so that by breathing life into our
constitution by including this provision it
seems to me we are recognizing really
the advent of a new principle, a principle
which should be recognized in this con-
stitution, and should be passed on to
our legislators.
THE PRESIDENT: Delegate Harry
Taylor.
DELEGATE H.TAYLOR: Mr. President
and ladies and gentlemen of the Con-
vention: As a result of the vote the last
time I got up to talk. The people who were
opposed to this motion for reconsideration
have invited me to speak in favor of it.
(Laughter.)
We heard a lot about Pandora's box here
in the Convention, and I submit that the
lid has been flipped up and down so often
that the hinges are now loose, and ready to
fall off, but I do not think we have ever
given it as big a flip as we will if we pass
this provision allegedly to help the con-
sumer.
The riots and the protests that we have
today I think are more from political
promises that are incapable of enforcement
than anything else.
This particular provision does absolutely
nothing. It holds out hope, but still it may
well do great harm to those people whom
we seek to help.
I say that for this reason. The General
Assembly of Maryland has acted in this
field; the Attorney General has set up a
consumer's protection section within its
office. These people are running hard to
help the consumer, and sometimes when
someone is running hard, you give him a
little push and you make him fall. And this
push, to the General Assembly and all of
those who are working so hard to help
the consumer, may just be the thing
that says, well, we cannot satisfy every-
body, so let us get out of this and not beat
our brains out. I ask you to vote to re-
consider this, and let us strike this thing
out of our constitution.
We talk about freezing in the constitu-
tion things that are not necessary there,
and if we freeze in enough of them we are
going to create an iceberg that is going to
sink on May 14th.
THE PRESIDENT: Delegate Key.
DELEGATE KEY: Mr. President, and
ladies and gentlemen:
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