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were reasonably satisfied with what the
article did.
As the Chairman has already stated,
there are no minority reports.
Not only the Recommendation, but the
Committee Memorandum itself was re-
viewed page by page by the Committee, and
the Recommendation was not released until
everyone was satisfied with what was in
the Memorandum.
The 13 sections that you see here are the
final product of the entire Committee, and
are not based on the ideas of only a ma-
jority.
Let me mention, if I may, the structure
of the Recommendation in the Memoran-
dum. Sections 7.01 through 7.12 of the Com-
mittee Recommendation are intended to be
included in the local government article.
Section 8.06 is intended for inclusion in the
general provisions article.
The recommended sections of Article VII
are set forth by us in a deliberate order,
subject to inevitable surgery by the Com-
mittee on Style, Drafting and Arrangement.
Section 7.01 relates to definitions used,
particularly in the local government arti-
cle, but also throughout the Constitution.
Sections 7.02 through 7.05 deal with
counties.
Section 7.06 controls the general appli-
cation of laws, and like section 7.01 is in-
tended to be applicable throughout the Con-
stitution.
Sections 7.10 and 7.11 concern multi-
county governments.
Section 7.12 includes limitations on the
extensions of credit by all units of local
government; and, sections 7.07 through
7.09 deal with municipal corporations, and
civil units.
The Committee Memorandum, starting on
page 4, contains summaries giving some of
the reasons for the recommendations and
explaining them generally.
Commending on page 9 are detailed com-
ments on each of the provisions with the
provisions typed above them. At this time
I call the attention of the Committee of the
Whole to the fact that there are a few mis-
prints and typographical errors in some of
the sections as they are reproduced in the
Memorandum. The precise language is set
forth in the Recommendation, and should
be consulted if you are in doubt at any
point.
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Exhibit 1 to the Committee Memorandum
simply lists some of the research papers
which were utilized including all those
which the Committee had prepared for it.
Exhibit 2, beginning on page 39, is in-
tended to set forth concisely the Maryland
experience with public local legislation.
We used as sources a series of studies of
this problem, the first one of which was
done in 1904. The footnotes refer to the
various sources from which the informa-
tion was obtained.
In Table 1, on page 41 of the Committee
Memorandum, we have used the 1966 and
1967 legislative records to illustrate what
would have happened to the local bills
which were passed by the General Assem-
bly had all counties had shared home rule
powers in each of those years.
If you refer to that very briefly, you will
see, in the categories at the top of Table 1,
a total of 146 bills in 1966, and 145 bills
in 1967. These could have been passed by
county councils if all counties had been
home rule counties at that time.
Table 2 on page 42 shows the number of
local bills passed by the legislature for
each county in the years indicated. You can
see from this what happened in the four
counties that have charters, Montgomery,
Baltimore, Anne Arundel, and Wicomico.
I think a review of the recommendations
of the Local Government Committee shows
that all sections of the recommendation are
integrated and unified to provide a series
of balanced provisions for local government
in Maryland.
As we went through the sections that we
adopted, to make a final review of them
and to clarify the meaning of each sen-
tence, we repeatedly found that changing
one sentence required a reappraisal of other
sections. Language which at first seemed
to clarify our meaning at times actually,
upon analysis, would cloud the meaning of
the section. We found this to be particularly
true with respect to section 7.05, "Powers
of Counties," and section 7.06, "General
Application of Laws." These two provisions,
as you know, are highly technical, and
also closely interrelated.
Let me speak, if I may, in summary
form about the more important issues
which your Committee considered and dis-
cussed, and what was done with respect
to them.
First, was whether to require each county
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