I would answer it this way: if we don't
adopt it, then our citizens will look upon
this $8,000 salary as pay for ninety days.
Any way you look at it, I know they will,
because their constitution is going to say 90
days. True, they may have thirty more, but
that is not the way the people are going
to look at it. It is a fractionalized legis-
lature.
THE CHAIRMAN: Delegate White.
DELEGATE WHITE: Mr. Chairman of
the Minority Report, you indicate that pos-
sibly you believe that the job in this legis-
lature has reached a point of a full time
job. I wonder, would you agree that we
could make this a full time job with com-
pensation possibly of $15,000 a year?
THE CHAIRMAN: Delegate Bard.
DELEGATE BARD: The question be-
fore us at this time is not salary nor did
the minority report recommend, as I made
clear earlier, Delegate White, that there
would not be the possibility of men who
serve in our legislature not holding their
regular positions. The seventeen states
which have the legislatively determined
session have within it men and women who
hold career positions in other areas. This
seems to work out on the basis of the sched-
ule they set forth.
We are not necessarily saying that they
should be limited to this as their only task.
THE CHAIRMAN: Delegate White.
DELEGATE WHITE: Do you feel the
people would be hostile to the idea of mak-
ing this a full time job?
THE CHAIRMAN: Delegate Bard.
DELEGATE BARD: It may well be
once you get a legislatively determined ses-
sion, you can then move in this other di-
rection; but I for one do not believe that
the two are necessarily wedded.
On the other hand, I would add, Delegate
White, that the legislatively determined
session as it has operated in the seventeen
states does solve some of the problems,
solutions of which are sought by those
along the lines of looking upon this as your
main position.
THE CHAIRMAN: Delegate Gilchrist.
DELEGATE GILCHRIST: Delegate
Bard, is it not true that under your amend-
ment the Maryland legislature could meet
365 days a year, if it chose?
THE CHAIRMAN: Delegate Bard.
DELEGATE BARD: I would think if we |
were in a serious war, in which the states
had to play a highly important role, it
would be possible for us to meet 365 days
a year, and I would be mighty happy that
that would hold true, that possibility. I
would not be happy about the war.
In other words, all experience has indi-
cated that you meet in terms of the re-
quirements of the times. The 17 states that
have this particular option have not met
during this period.
As I have studied the General Assembly
sessions, Delegate Gilchrist, which followed
that of 1776, and which followed that of
185I immediately after the Constitution,
and which followed that of 1864, they did
not meet 365 days. Nor did the legislators
of the seventeen states. This is the shibbo-
leth which is set forth against the legis-
latively determined session in order to place
incredibility upon the legislature.
I have full faith in the legislature not
doing anything of that sort.
DELEGATE GILCHRIST: Delegate
Bard, is it not also true if the legislature
wanted to do so under this amendment they
could meet every Thursday and Friday, 52
weeks a year?
DELEGATE BARD: If the legislature
desired to skip a month on particular occa-
sions under this plan this would be true.
But it would also be true that if there were
a serious affair within the State they could
extend their calendar.
I think the essential possibility is that
when a serious problem arises, since we are
in an era in which we cannot pinpoint the
time that we need to spend, any more than
you and I can pinpoint our days when we
are down here, I would say this is for the
good.
THE CHAIRMAN: Delegate Gilchrist,
one more question.
DELEGATE GILCHRIST: Are there
not several states in the United States in
which there is a serious problem with the
legislature because they meet two days a
week and then go home?
DELEGATE BARD: To my knowledge
there are far more problems, serious in na-
ture, among those legislatures which do not
meet their responsibilities because the clos-
ing day is so narrow that it becomes con-
venient to say, we cannot handle this prob-
lem. The legislators themselves will tell
you this, and they have told us this, Dele-
gate Gilchrist, that the most serious prob-
lem is that the time is so regulated. |
