limit from three minutes to five minutes.
A vote No is a vote against.
Are you ready for the question?
(Call for the question.)
All those in favor of the motion to amend
signify by saying Aye; contrary, No. The
Ayes have it. The motion carries. The
amendment is adopted.
Is there any further discussion of the
motion to resolve into a Committee of the
Whole and to adopt Debate Schedule No.
1 as amended?
(There was no response.)
Are you ready for the question?
(Call for the question,)
A vote Aye is a vote in favor of dissolv-
ing into the Committee of the Whole and
a vote in favor of Debate Schedule No. I
as amended. A vote No is a vote against.
All those in favor, signify by saying Aye;
contrary, No. The Ayes have it. It is so
ordered.
(Whereupon, at 12:42 P.M., the Conven-
tion resolved itself into the Committee of
the Whole.)
(The mace was removed by the Sergeant-
at-Arms.)
COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE
NOVEMBER 7, 1967—12:42 P.M.
PRESIDENT H. VERNON ENEY,
PRESIDING
THE CHAIRMAN: The Committee of
the Whole will now come to order.
The Chair recognizes Delegate Gallagher
for the purpose of presenting Committee
Recommendation LB-I.
DELEGATE GALLAGHER: Mr. Chair-
man, ladies and gentlemen of the Commit-
tee:
In presenting the first report of the Com-
mittee on the Legislative Branch, I deem
it appropriate to say that this Constitu-
tional Convention, unlike the General As-
sembly of Maryland, does not carry with
committee reports an affirmative presump-
tion in favor of these reports. Conse-
quently, the chairman cannot expect fidel-
ity on the part of the majority of the
members of his committee with respect to
the committee reports. |
I would hasten to point out, however,
that despite this lack of a presumption
and the lack of necessity for fidelity to the
committee report, if the Committee of the
Whole would seek to do what each of the
committees has done, that is, to examine in
the same detail, to reargue all the argu-
ments, to set forth the full presentation of
witnesses, that we would well be here until
January, 1969, and consider ourselves lucky
to go home then.
What I say here I say not for the pur-
pose of being spared honest debate and re-
flection and consideration. It does seem to
me, however, that the hundreds of hours
that have gone into the consideration of
these matters by the Legislative Branch,
the careful consideration of the testimony
of 68 witnesses who appeared before us in
connection with these matters, the evalua-
tion of questionnaires which were sub-
mitted to many persons who did not testify,
certainly suggest that the decision and
the recommendation of the Committee
carries with it, if not some presumption
of validity or an affirmative stance, cer-
tainly some additional substantive margin
in its favor, which can really be overridden,
as it is admitted by the members of this
Convention. I place these ideas before you
in the interest of accomplishing what we
must do by the stipulated deadline.
The report of the Committee on the
Legislative Branch represents the maxi-
mum concerted efforts of that body to out-
line the structure for a modern General
Assembly. The Committee itself is com-
posed of seven present or former members
of the General Assembly, three professional
educators, a former judge, a former Presi-
dent of the Maryland Senate, and I might
say, a generous representation from the
minority party, not to mention three from
the disstaff side. Ten of our twenty mem-
bers are lawyers, one has served as an aide
on Capitol Hill, and two of the Committee
members were leading figures in the five-
year fight for reapportionment in Mary-
land. Virtually all 20 of the Committee
members have had contact with state gov-
ernment and some are long-time profes-
sional students of state legislatures, in-
cluding Maryland's.
The aim of the Committee was to struc-
ture a legislature which provides the maxi-
mum practicable representation, with the
utmost efficiency. The Committee recog-
nizes that at some point the overemphasis
of one would unduly restrict and limit the
operation of the other. Wherever possible,
the Committee strove to achieve a full self- |
