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vention Commission, which preceded this
conclave, a fact which gives heart to those
of us who have been concerned by the
devastating defeat of the New York Con-
stitution recently, and the notable lack of
success of the Rhode Island Convention.
I say this because some participants and
observers of these two experiments have
expressed the feeling that these two states
made fundamental error in not providing
for and relying on well-prepared Commis-
sion studies.
I must admit I have heard some dissi-
dents in this State complain that the Mary-
land Convention is nothing more than a
ratifying body for the Commission draft.
However, lest the majority of the Com-
mittee on the Judicial Branch be chastised
for being wedded to the Commission draft,
let me be the first to confess the minority
loves the draft too.
Although we feel we are as morally com-
mitted to our task as the majority upon
the grounds let's say of incompatibility, we
are filing for a divorce a mensa, a partial
divorce if you will, with the hope that at
the conclusion of the debate the Committee
of the Whole have effected a reconciliation.
It is interesting to observe the staffing
of our Judicial Committee with fourteen
lawyers and six non-lawyers. One might
surmise that the line-up would be lawyer
versus layman. That perhaps was the case
for a while, but as lawmakers as well as
law enforcers and those responsible for
adjudication appeared before the Commit-
tee, the thoughtful and penetrating analy-
ses of some of the supposedly naive lay-
men, complemented I might say by many
members of the Judiciary, convinced at
least a few of us who have intimate day-
to-day contact with the courts that we
should not be meek sheep following a legal
shepherd. NQ pun intended, Mr. Chairman.
Thus some differences arose among law-
yers on the Committee and that produced
a somewhat different minority than might
have been anticipated.
In passing you should be made aware of
the fact that on several incidental issues
over one-third of the Committee voted
against the majority. Analysis of the votes
on this matter does not indicate a con-
sistent pattern. Indeed we have sought to
provide a sounding board for several mem-
bers of the majority by including some of
these issues in our Report because they
should be considered, not necessarily de-
bated at length but considered by this body.
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Some other matters of very considerable
importance contained in our Report missed
being the majority by only one vote. We do
indeed, as Chairman Mudd has indicated,
endorse many provisions in the Committee
Recommendation JB-1, although I under-
stand that some of the members of the ma-
jority are still searching for those areas of
agreement. Let us keep constantly in mind
that the judicial branch is the most poten-
tially tyrannical of the three branches of
government with respect to individual lib-
erties: first, because its actions directly
and explicitly affect specific individuals;
second, because its officers are most in-
sulated from popular control; third, be-
cause its activities receive the least public
scrutiny.
Let me emphasize that we are in no way
criticizing past or present members of the
Maryland bench. Indeed, when we recall
the names of such outstanding jurists as
Carroll T. Bond, Edward S. Delaplaine,
Simon E. Sobeloff, presently a distinguished
member of the U. S. Court of Appeals, F.
Neal Parke, Frederick Brune and Hall
Hammond, presently our chief judges of
the Court of Appeals. I should say at this
point that I will not embarass the noted
judges sitting among us by personal ref-
erence, wherein we recall these men, ones
I mentioned and many others. We know
the state bench has been and is manned by
highly qualified dedicated public servants.
I would also note that these men have
served under the present appointive elec-
tive system, a system which the Institute
of Judicial Administration has called, and
I quote, "basically sound with some fea-
tures far in advance of those found in
many other jurisdictions, a system that
ought not to be scrapped but one that de-
serves and needs to be improved and
strengthened."
We of the minority are anxious to im-
prove and strengthen the courts by modify-
ing and in some cases going beyond the
recommendations of the majority of the
Committee on the Judiciary.
As the majority was dedicated in the
performance of its task, again let me em-
phasize the dedication of the minority to
the improvement of the state judiciary
within the framework of a republican form
of government. To give just one example,
the very significant matter of establishing
a Commission on Judicial Disability would
not have passed this Committee without
the wholehearted support of the signatories
of this Minority Report. That, we submit,
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