614 JOURNAL OF PROCEEDINGS [Mar. 4,

The President presented the following:

ANNAPOLIS, March 4, 1892.
To the Honorable,

the Senate of Maryland;

GENTLEMEN: I received yesterday a copy of an
order passed by your Honorable Body on February
26th, ult., asking my opinion upon the following ques-
tion, viz:

"Can the present Session of the General Assembly
constitutionally enact any law under the provisions of
the amendment of section 1, of Article 7, of the Con-
stitution, prescribing for any of those County Com-
missioners who were elected in November last, terms
of service which shall continue beyond the period of
two years?"

This question was accompanied by a copy of the re-
port of your Committee on Judicial Proceedings, sub-
mitted on the 26th day of February, ult., in which the
opinion is clearly and strongly stated that the General
Assembly, at its present session, not only have the
power, but that it is their duty to carry into effect the
recent Constitutional Amendment, by defining and
limiting the terms of office of the County Commis-
sioners elected in November last, not to exceed in any
case the period of six years.

In this opinion I entirely concur.

When the Constitutional Amendment was adopted,
it displaced and superceded the pre-existing section;
and as by its terms it embraced the County Commis-
sioners elected on the same day upon which it was
adopted, it necessarily repealed the limitation of two
years for which, prior to its adoption, County Com-
missioners were elected, and left the County Commis-
sioners elected last November without any definite
and prescribed tenure, But it manifestly contem-
plated and its framers and the people who adopted it,
expected that this General Assembly would, by ap-
propriate legislation, define and limit their terms of
office and thus make definite and specific that which.
it purposely left to be "prescribed by law. "

If this General Assembly should adjourn without
enacting a law fixing the tenure of the County Com-