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DELEGATE HARDWICKE : The an-
swer to your question is yes.
DELEGATE RYBCZYNSKI: What
would prevent it?
DELEGATE HARDWICKE: There is
nothing to prevent it.
DELEGATE RYBCZYNSKI: Then we
need an amendment.
DELEGATE JAMES (presiding) : Dele-
gate Henderson.
DELEGATE HENDERSON: I hesitate
to rise on this point. I am not speaking now
about the spouse, but I am speaking about
the pension of retired judges. Being a re-
tired judge myself, I may have a special
interest which I am free to disclose at this
time, but at the same time, I think I know
the history of this, and I would like to try
to explain why I think it is proper to set
these things out in the constitution.
At the present time, the salaries of the
judges at the superior court level in Balti-
more City and in two other counties, I be-
lieve, are fixed and paid by supplementa-
tion at the $30,000 figure. It would not be
possible, I take it, during the term of office
of any of those judges to reduce that sal-
ary, so that you have that figure really
pegged in the constitution.
You have $22,000 well pegged in the con-
stitution for the district court when that
comes along because the judges, I believe,
in Montgomery County, are paid $21,500.
As far as the Intermediate Court of Ap-
peals is concerned, and the Court of Ap-
peals itself, there should be some reason-
able differentiation, between the work.
When I was on the Supreme Bench I got
the great salary of $10,000 a year and when
I went to the Court of Appeals the salary
there was $11,000, but for probably the last
five years of my service on the Court of
Appeals, I was getting $25,000, while the
trial judges whose work I was passing on
were getting twenty-seven and thirty, so
that a twenty-five hundred differentiation
between the judges of the Intermediate
Court, and, again, of the Court of Appeals,
would seem to be a reasonable one in view
of the hierarchy and the responsibilities
that those judges carry.
In addition to that being the figure which
has already been approved, both by the
Bar Association and the Legislative Coun-
cil, it seems to me that they can be justified
and defended on that basis, just as a mat-
ter of pure common sense.
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I just offer that as a suggestion. To
leave it out of the constitution and leave it
to the legislature would make it possible,
and this is the thing we have discussed in
the Judicial Branch Committee.
It would make it possible for the local
people to go and get their judges' salaries
raised by supplementation and, therefore,
raise the ante so that when the change
went into effect, you would have a higher
level set. By putting this thirty thousand
figure in the constitution for the superior
court judges, you prevent this local supple-
mentation from getting out of hand and
fix it at a figure which I suggest is the
minimum which could be fixed under the
present situation.
DELEGATE JAMES (presiding) : Judge
Henderson, is this schedule also fixed by
the governor's commission to study judicial
salaries? I believe that is the case.
DELEGATE HENDERSON: I also be-
lieve that is the case.
DELEGATE JAMES (presiding) : I be-
lieve Delegate Case was vice-chairman of
that commission.
Delegate Weidemeyer.
DELEGATE WEIDEMEYER: I would
like to ask Delegate Hardwicke a question
pertaining to sub-section D of section 23,
which provides that a spouse who is en-
titled to a pension under the provisions of
this section shall be paid for the period of
her life, unless she remarries, in which
event the pension is to cease.
I wonder what the intent is behind that
section. Is it intended to be compensatory
or is it to provide a premium for remaining
a widow?
DELEGATE JAMES (presiding) : You
do not have to answer that. We get this
complaint frequently in the legislature. The
women say they should not be penalized for
remarrying. It is an old question.
DELEGATE HARDWICKE: The whole
problem here, Delegate Weidemeyer, and
those others of you, as Delegate Rybczyn-
ski, who have problems with this, is we are
not equipped to give to the legislature a
profound matter and we have tried in set-
ting up this legislation in this constitution
to take existing law, the existing constitu-
tion, or existing legislative proposals. We
have tried to do a minimum of violence to
them. We recognize this can be changed
very promptly by the legislature. This is
better than nothing. That is about as far
as we can go with it because if we do not
put something in here there will be nothing.
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