1870.] OF THE HOUSE OF DELEGATES. 1089

the form in which they are presented, and for the reasons,
among others, which they now proceed to assign. About
three months before the commencement of the present session,
the Governor was, for the first time, made aware that the
Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company had since July, 1868,
refuged to pay any longer into the Treasury the one-fifth of
the revenues derived from the transportation of passengers
over its Washington Branch as required by the Act of 1832,
and its several supplements, basing its refusal upon au
alleged conflict between that requirement and the Federal
Constitution, and in addition thereto, alleging a claim of
set-off on account of certain premiums on gold paid in re-
mitting to London the interest on the sterling debt in 1883
and 1864.

In view of the gravity of the questions raised by the Com-
pany, the Governor, very properly, as this Committee thinks,
deferred taking action to enforce the rights of the State until
he should first have the advice of the General Assembly,
then about to convene At an early day of the session, this
Committee submitted certain Joint Resolutions, looking to
the enforcement of the rights of the State, and the obtension.
of adequate security for their future maintenance by a writ
of scire facias to forfeit the existing charter of the Company.

With a generous forbearance towards the Company which
thus far has failed to elicit any change in its hostile attitude
towards the State, the House of Delegates engrafted on those
Resolutions a provision that a committee should be appointed
by the Legislature to investigate the demands of the State
and the claims of the Company, and if the Railroad Company
should conform itself within a specified time to the award of
the Committee, then that proceedings under the scire facias
should not be taken. Thus qualified, the resolutions were
adopted by more than three-fourths of the members present,
and were sent to the Senate. That body, after long conside-
ration and protracted debate, finally, upon the 16th day of
March, dissented from the Resolutions of the House, and upon
the 24th day of March, adopted in stead the Resolutions now
under consideration. Your Committee have to suggest that
if the united wisdom of the two Houses has, during nearly
three months, failed to make a satisfactory conclusion in the
premises, this fact must supply a cogent reason to justify the
Executive in delaying action until the advice of the General
Assembly could be taken; moreover, the Constitution itself
contemplates that the Legislature, no less than the Governor,
is charged with the general duty of directing the legal pro-
ceedings to be instituted in behalf of the State whenever
necessary or appropriate. In the third section of the fifth
Article it is provided, that the Attorney General "shall
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