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THE PRESIDENT: Delegate Marion,
do you yield to a question?
DELEGATE MARION: Yes, sir.
THE PRESIDENT: Delegate Johnson.
DELEGATE JOHNSON: I am sorry I
have not had a complete opportunity to
adjust to the amendment, but I want to
ask is it in anyway a change in substance
or in any way a change of an under-
standing of any colloquy that existed
either in the Committee of the Whole or
in the Convention?
THE PRESIDENT: Delegate Marion.
DELEGATE MARION: No, it is not
intended at all to change the substance of
the section, and if you refer to the various
colloquies you had with Chairman Mudd
and with the Chair on the use of the words
in this section, it is not intended to change
any of the questions and answers in those
colloquies.
THE PRESIDENT: Delegate Johnson.
DELEGATE JOHNSON: Again, please
understand that I have not had a full op-
portunity to completely comprehend this
amendment, but would this amendment not,
perhaps, give rule-making power in the
Court of Appeals and matters governing
the administration of the courts that is not
otherwise provided in Article 5?
THE PRESIDENT: Delegate Marion?
DELEGATE MARION: I do not see
that, Delegate Johnson.
THE PRESIDENT: Delegate Marion, I
think it might be helpful if you would read
the sentence as it would read when
amended.
DELEGATE MARION: The sentence
would read: "The General Assembly, by
law, shall have concurrent power to regu-
late the matters enumerated in this sec-
tion, except when these matters are spe-
cifically required by this Constitution to
be prescribed by rule."
THE PRESIDENT: Delegate Johnson.
DELEGATE JOHNSON: Would or
would not if this amendment is adopted,
would it give to the Court of Appeals con-
current rule-making power in areas in Ar-
ticle 5 where we have specifically recited
that the legislature shall have that power,
and, in other words, exclusive power not
subject to rule-making power, and, there-
fore not concurrent?
THE PRESIDENT: Delegate Marion?
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DELEGATE MARION: I do not believe
so. This section, as it is written, gives the
Court of Appeals the power to prescribe
rules in the first sentence in three specific
areas.
The next sentence which this amend-
ment is designed to clarify simply gives
the General Assembly the authority to act
by law, a concurrent power to act by law
in those three areas, except when any of
those things that might be taken to be
encompassed within the three categories
of the first sentence are spelled out else-
where in that article and are specifically
required to be prescribed by rule, and in
those instances it says, the Court of Ap-
peals, by rule.
I see no way that it could entitle the
Court of Appeals to have a jurisdiction to
do by rule what we say the General As-
sembly is to do by law elsewhere.
THE PRESIDENT: Delegate Johnson.
DELEGATE JOHNSON: Does it not
say what you purport it to say without
the amendment?
THE PRESIDENT: Delegate Marion.
DELEGATE MARION: If you are ask-
ing me is it not true that it makes no
substantive change, I would say yes.
THE PRESIDENT: Delegate Johnson.
DELEGATE JOHNSON: No further
questions.
THE PRESIDENT: Delegate Weide-
meyer.
DELEGATE WEIDEMEYER: Delegate
Marion, the first sentence of section 5.03,
which confers upon the Court of Appeals
the power to prescribe rules is a new de-
parture, as far as I can recall constitu-
tionally, because the Court had no power
to prescribe rules before. Their only power
was that derived from act of the legis-
lature. Now specifically in the first sen-
tence this gives it to them constitutionally,
and we definitely understood that it was to
be a concurrent power of rule-making.
When you put in "The General Assembly
shall by law have concurrent power to
regulate matters subject to rule, except
when these matters are specifically re-
quired for this Constitution to be pre-
scribed by rule", are you not then deleting
and cutting out the concurrent power of
the legislature with the Court of Appeals
that we definitely understood in the Com-
mittee of the Whole.
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