332 JOURNAL OF PROCEEDINGS [Feb. 19,

are of the essence of the law and must be strictly
observed. The ballots cast at St. Leonard's precinct
did not comply with a single one of the above named re-
quirements. The ballots used at this precinct were
delivered to the Judges by a person unauthorized to
have them in his possession, some of which were loose
and not in sealed packages, they had not the official
endorsement required; and before they were voted the
official endorsement written over signature of supervisor
was changed with pen and ink, ''first being stricken
out and second inserted. " The printed character of
the official endorsement was destroyed.

It will not do to say that it was impossible to tell
how the voter voted with these ballots, and that the
change made in the ballots did not destroy the secrecy
of the ballot. The answer to this is, that the General
Assembly has prescribed the requirements to be
observed to insure secrecy, and they must be strictly
followed. The law says, no ballot without the official
endorsement as prescribed and the initials of the regu-
larly appointed Ballot Clerk, shall be allowed to be
deposited in the ballot box or counted.

It is not contended that the ballots cast at St.
Leonard's precinct complied with this requirement of
law.

For this additional reason therefore, the committee
is of opinion that these ballots should not be counted.

This portion of the opinion of your committee re-
ceives support from the recent decisions by the Court
of Appeals of New York, reported in 29 N. E. Re-
porter, 322.

4, The rejection of the ballots cast at St. Leonard's
Precinct, leaves the contestee with 171 majority, and
entitles him to the seat in the Senate from Calvert
county. The prayer of the contestant in his memorial
is, that the vote at St. Leonard's Precinct be counted,
and that he be given the seat in the Senate now oc-
cupied by the contested, because the counting of the
vote cast at said precinct gives him a majority in the
county. He does not ask in his memorial that the
Senate order a new election. The contestee contends
that the contestant is limited in his demands to the
prayer of his memorial, and that the Senate cannot
order a new election, because it is not asked in the