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The Chair recognizes Delegate Johnson
and requests he come forward to the read-
ing desk.
The Chair recognizes Delegate Beatrice
Miller, who had a question to put to Dele-
gate Johnson.
DELEGATE B. MILLER: Mr. Chair-
man, I was going to ask the Chairman of
the minority report if the minority had
ever considered specifically the words in
the model constitution in relation to the
first section on which he has the minority
report. In that, as I recall, the model con-
stitution calls for such other lower courts
as may be set up by law, or by rule, as not
inconsistent with law.
Has there been any consideration of the
specific wording of the model constitution?
DELEGATE JOHNSON: Yes, we did
consider the wording of the model constitu-
tion, by the National Municipal League,
and if my memory serves me correct, that
wording did say something about the es-
tablishment of other inferior courts as pro-
vided by law.
We felt inasmuch as the district court
would be the lower tier court, and because
of the possibility of inferior courts putting
us back in the magistrate court system
that we now have, and apparently what
everyone is trying to get away from, that
that would not be correct, to say the estab-
lishment of inferior courts.
I think that I should also point out that
there are no states, to our knowledge, that
provide for a four-tier unified court sys-
tem, and if you have a four-tier system you
are really starting from the bottom and
working up. Our amendment goes to the
problem of what other special, or addi-
tional courts may or may not be needed. I
do not know of any now, but inasmuch as
we are writing this constitution for 50 or
100 years, the situation might develop; so
other inferior courts probably would not
be applicable with a four-tier court system
that we would adopt.
THE CHAIRMAN: Are there any other
questions of the minority spokesman with
respect to sections 5.01 to 5.11?
Delegate Macdonald.
DELEGATE MACDONALD: Delegate
Johnson, I intend to introduce an amend-
ment to section 5.08 and section 5.10, on
line 14 of page 3 and one line 41 of page
3, which would in effect provide for func-
tional divisions to be established as pre-
scribed by rule or by law.
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If that amendment were acted on favor-
ably, would you feel that your amendment
to which you are addressing yourself now
would be unnecessary?
DELEGATE JOHNSON: Let me an-
swer it in this way:
I am sympathetic, if not in favor, and
I am probably in favor with the amend-
ment that you propose, but it really does
not answer the question of special courts,
such as the possibility of establishing a
single tax court.
I do not know whether or not these par-
ticular special courts will ever be needed,
and I do not know whether or not any other
special courts will be needed. We just felt
that perhaps, in writing this constitution,
we would want to allow for the flexibility.
Let me be perfectly frank in saying that,
as of this time, I believe that a unified
judicial court system, a four-tier court sys-
tem, particularly with the provision that
the functional divisions will be determined
by rule or by law, will answer all the im-
mediate problems of Maryland. Yes, they
will. I can not predict what will happen
twenty-five or fifty years from now, and we
wanted to allow that flexibility or that lati-
tude, if in fact the legislature in its wis-
dom at that time determined that some
other court might be necessary.
May I also answer the question by say-
ing that when you provide for functional
divisions in the district court or superior
court you, of course, mean that each and
every court in each and every county or in
each and every district will have the same
jurisdiction, so that otherwise you will not
have a unified judicial court system.
It is just a question whether or not you
would want to have all the courts handle
such specialized matters as tax or labor;
and whether or not they want to assume
the responsibility within their functional
divisions.
I think it would work that way. I think
it would be all right, but to come right
back to the problem of whether we can
anticipate future needs, I think that our
amendments will take care of that. I can
not be any more specific than that, but it
is necessary now, though it may be neces-
sary in the future.
THE CHAIRMAN: Are there any other
questions of the minority spokesman?
Delegate Mitchell.
DELEGATE MITCHELL: Mr. Presi-
dent and Delegate Johnson.
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