from 1851 to 1867 173

The result of the change was not only a shorten-
ing of the stay of individual lawyers in Annapolis,
but a cutting down of the numbers of lawyers
arguing particular cases. With the whole bar
present, combinations of many in one case were
easier and more frequent; when a journey was
to be taken for one case, groups of lawyers would
not ordinarily take it.

It was inevitable that the constitution of 1864,
disfranchising such a large portion of the citizens
as it did, should pass with the war. In the sum-
mer of 1865 a mass-meeting in Howard County
urged a contest in the courts on the validity of the
act of 1865, chapter 174, which had carried out
the disfranchisement, and the movement resulted
in the case of Anderson v. Baker, reported in 23
Maryland, 531. It was argued before the full
court by Robert J. Brent, Thomas G. Pratt and
Reverdy Johnson against the validity of the law,
and by the Attorney General, Alexander Randall,
and R. M. Williams in support of it. On Novem-
ber 2, 1865, each of the judges filed a separate
opinion, Judge Goldsborough, however, merely
noting his concurrence with the majority; and
Chief Judge Bowie and Judges Goldsborough,
Cochran and Weisel decided that the law was
valid, while Judge Bartol dissented. On January
24, 1866, another mass-meeting was held in Balti-
more, and it included delegates from the several
counties chosen by the Democratic Conservative
members of the General Assembly, among them
one past judge of the Court of Appeals, John
Thomson Mason, and three who were to become
judges, Richard H. Alvey, John Ritchie and