1946] OF THE HOUSE OF DELEGATES. 11

MESSAGE FROM THE EXECUTIVE.

The Secretary of State appeared and delivered the following
message from the Executive:

EXECUTIVE DEPARTMENT

ANNAPOLIS, MD., December 26, 1946.

Honorable John R. White,

Speaker of the House of Delegates,
State House,
Annapolis, Maryland.

Dear Mr. White:

It is a particular pleasure to welcome again to the State House
the members of your Honorable Body with whom it has been my
pleasure to work during past years, and to outline the reason which
made it necessary to issue a call for this Special Session.

The victorious ending of the war, toward which we all looked so
hopefully during the last session of the General Assembly, has
brought with it new problems, occasioned chiefly by the rapid-
increase in costs of food and materials as well as the consequent
necessity of increasing salaries of our loyal State employees to
enable them to meet the increased costs of living.

Having planned our budget for this fiscal year at a time when
both prices and salaries were under rigid government control, it was
not possible to foresee the developments which followed the cessa-
tion of war and the lifting of these government controls. During
the months of the present fiscal year, it has been apparent that the
State Departments and Agencies would have a difficult time in
operating on the budgetary provisions made for them. With other
members of the Board of Public Works and the State's fiscal officers,
I have watched closely the developments and deferred the call of
this Special Session until we were in the best position to forsee
the needs for the second half of the current fiscal year. It would
have been unfortunate if the session had been called earlier as
economic developments in recent weeks might have disrupted plans
made on the basis of conditions existing several months previous.

Fortunately, the financial condition of the State is such that we
are able to meet the increased salary and other costs from accumu-
lated surplus, without the necessity of levying any new taxes.
Indeed, according to the latest reports from the State Comptroller,
a General Fund Surplus of approximately $16,800,000 has been
estimated. Inasmuch as the required adjustments to the 1947