60 EIGHTEENTH ANNUAL REPORT

One of the oddities of the 1953 Session of the General Assembly was
House Bill No. 354. The story begins with Chapter 542 of the Acts of
1949, which provided for a penalty to be paid by anyone presenting for
recordation any instrument which was not in good order. It also made
certain special provisions for the form of instruments presented for recorda-
tion in offices where recording was done by photostat camera. The provisions
of this Act were inadvertently omitted from the Annotated Code of 1951;
therefore, the preamble to the Act of 1953 said, among other things, that
"It is desirable to re-enact these provisions without change in order to
remove any doubts as to their effectiveness." In the meanwhile, many
counties had introduced microfilming as a method of recording, and we
therefore urged the sponsor of the bill to amend it in order to include micro-
filming. This was done and there was every expectation that the amended
bill would pass, but unfortunately, it did not. Since microfilming and photo-
stating are now almost the only means of recording found in Maryland
courthouses, they will surely have to be dealt with within the near future.
It is our hope that House Bill No. 354 can be revived at the next session.