1654                            JOINT RESOLUTIONS

The people of Maryland now are told that some 73,400 persons
receive public welfare aid in Maryland, with the expectation that
during the next fiscal year the caseloads will swell by about 15,800
additional persons.

The members of the General Assembly of Maryland believe that
any person truly in need should receive public assistance. At the
same time, they question sharply the rapid and incessant upward
spiral in the demands of public welfare officials.

The huge expenditures for public welfare, becoming vastly greater
year by year, come during times of unprecedented prosperity.

In addition, this State and this nation now are faced with a sad
and deplorable situation in which a whole generation of our people
know nothing but public welfare grants.

On all sides it becomes apparent that we are sapping the energy,
initiative, and self-reliance of millions of our people, and that whole
blocs of residents in our great cities live on and by welfare monies.

We need to know why there is this persistent growth in welfare
rolls. The most obvious increases come in the program of aid to
dependent children. But again we need to know why this increase
is in much greater proportion than are the increases in population.
We need to know if these are the first generation fruits of a new
welfare society. We need to know also why practically one-half of
the children on this program are illegitimate, so that the A.D.C.
program is becoming one of subsidized promiscuity.

The members of the General Assembly are requesting a full,
frank, complete, and intensive study of the entire public welfare
picture in this State; now therefore, be it

Resolved by the General Assembly of Maryland, That the Legis-
lative Council acting either through a special or a regular committee
is requested to study with sharp intensity the increasing demands of
public welfare in this State, the emphasis both upon the unfortunate
by-products among the human values of our people and the un-
bearable fiscal demands upon the taxpayer; and be it further

Resolved, That the Legislative Council is requested at the 1966
Session of the General Assembly to provide a full, frank, complete,
and realistic report upon present welfare conditions in Maryland,
the reasons for the rapid rise, and the means by which the entire
public welfare trend may be revised and reduced.

Approved May 4, 1965.

No. 45
(Senate Joint Resolution 14)

Senate Joint Resolution expressing concern over the present plans
of the Army Corps of Engineers to dump material dredged in
the widening and deepening of the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal
and the ship channel to Baltimore into Chesapeake Bay and to