172 CONSTITUTION OF MARYLAND. [ART. XI

213. The election for the said eight members of the
Second Branch shall be held on the Tuesday next after the
first Monday in May, _ in the year eighteen hundred and ninety-
nine. Their terms of office shall be for four years, except that
the members of the Second Branch first elected shall determine
by lot their terms of office, so as to provide for the retirement
of one-half of the said members of the Second Branch at the
end of the first two years. On the Tuesday next after the first
Monday in May, in the year nineteen hundred and one, and in
every second year thereafter, an election shall be held for four
members of said Branch to fill the places of the members then
retiring.

214. There shall be elected on the Tuesday next after the
first Monday in May, in the year eighteen hundred and ninety-
. nine, and upon every fourth year thereafter, from the City at
large, a person to be the President of the Second Branch of
the City Council, who shall possess the qualifications required
and hereinbefore defined, of the Mayor of the City of Balti-
more. His duty shall be to preside over the Second Branch
of the City Council, and vote on all questions, and perform
such other duties as may be prescribed by ordinances not
inconsistent with this Article. He shall be paid a salary of
three thousand dollars per annum, payable monthly. A joint
convention of the two Branches of the City Council, by a
majority vote of all the members elected to the City Council,
may remove from office the President of the Second Branch
for incompetency, wilful neglect of duty or misdemeanor in
office, upon charges preferred by the Mayor, and after notice of
such charges is given to the President of the Second Branch,
and an opportunity afforded him to be heard.

215. The qualifications of electors of members of the
City Council shall be the same as those of electors of the
Mayor. All vacancies in the First Branch shall be filled with-
out delay by the First Branch from the ward in which the said
vacancy occurs, by an election of a person possessing the
qualifications hereinbefore prescribed, to fill the unexpired
term of the former incumbent. If a vacancy occurs in the
Second Branch, then said Branch shall forthwith fill said
vacancy by the election of a person possessing the qualifications
hereinbefore prescribed from the City at large or from the
proper Councilmanic District, if there be such District at that
time.