ARCHIVIST OF THE HALL OF RECORDS 53

mimeographing and photocopying. Additional duplicating services arc
expected to be included when the need arises.

Again this year, we continued to advise the Comptroller of the
Treasury on the expenditure of funds for record equipment, supplies,
and services for the Clerks of Court and the Registers of Wills of the
counties and Baltimore City. The Archivist and the Assistant Records
Administrator reviewed requests from twenty-three officers of seventeen
counties and Baltimore City. Among the items requested were micro-
film and photostat cameras, microfilm readers, quick-copy machines,
roller shelves, filing cabinets and new indexes. Proposals for the rebind-
ing and recovering of record books were also considered.

OPINIONS OF THE ATTORNEY GENERAL

We have ruefully conceded that legal authority for the destruction
of records is not easily achieved. The form and character of many
records are provided for by innumerable Acts of Assembly, opinions of
the Attorney General, court orders and even by the Constitution. Our
ultimate aim is to be free to maintain records in the most economical
and efficient fashion and to destroy them when their usefulness is over.
To achieve this objective we have now built up a respectable body of
law and opinion and more is needed. In the course of the year there
were two opinions of the Attorney General which bear directly on this
objective:

July 6, 1959

Mr. Charles M. Speicher

Chief Deputy Treasurer

Annapolis, Md.

Dear Mr. Speicher:

You state in your recent letter that the State Archivist
has recommended that all cancelled checks over fifteen years
old be destroyed. You inquire whether there would be any
legal objection to such disposal.

The destruction of State records is governed by the pro-
visions of Article 41, Annotated Code of Maryland (1957
Ed.). Section 180 of this Article charges each State agency
with the responsibility of developing "a continuing program
for the economical and efficient management of its records,