MARVIN MANDEL, Governor                       1819

imposed in the interest of the community. As an example of a valid
restraint on the conduct of an individual, Maryland courts have re-
peatedly held that a failure to obey a reasonable and lawful request
by a police officer, fairly made to prevent a disturbance to the public
peace, constitutes disorderly conduct. Harris v. State, 237 Md. 299,
206 A. 2d 254; Sharpe v. State, 231 Md. 401. In each case, the Court
held that the gist of the crime of disorderly conduct is the doing and
saying, or both, of that which offends, disturbs, incites, or tends to
incite a number of people gathered in the same area. Bachellor v.
State, 3 Md. App. 626, 240 A.2d 623.

In failing to limit the police officers of Charles and Queen Anne's
Counties from issuing "cease" orders in only those instances when
"lingering" or "loitering" might endanger the public peace (as is
already provided in Article 27, Section 123 of the Maryland Code, 1967
Replacement Volume), the Bill is not only in derogation of the com-
mon law crime of disorderly conduct, but also arbitrarily renders
otherwise innocent conduct as criminal in nature.

When subjecting House Bill 1435 to close scrutiny, as it should
be when it attempts to strip a citizen's liberties by a mere malum-
prohibitum test, it would be possible to convict a citizen who refused
the "cease" command of an officer, while standing on a street corner
watching the traffic of people without obstructing same; while in-
noculously sitting on a bench in a public park; while "lingering"
in a drug store waiting for a prescription to be filled; or while taking
too much time in finishing his meal at a restaurant that is "open to
the public".

When considering the constitutionality of a provision similar to
the Bill under consideration, the Supreme Court of the United States
in Shuttlesworth v. City of Birmingham, 382 U.S. 87, 15 L.ed. 2d
176, 86 S. Ct. 211, examined an ordinance which made it, "... un-
lawful for any person to stand or loiter upon a street or sidewalk
..... after having been requested by any police officer to move on."
Mr. Justice Stewart, in delivering the opinion of the Court invali-
dating the ordinance, stated:

"Literally read, ..... this ordinance says that a person may
stand on a public sidewalk in Birmingham only at the whim
of any police officer of that city. The constitutional vice
of so broad a provision needs no demonstration. It 'does
not provide for government by clearly defined laws, but
rather for government by the moment-to-moment opinions
of a policeman on his beat'. Cox v. Louisiana, 379 U.S. 536,
579, 13 L.ed. 2d 471, 501, 85 S. Ct. 453."

As written, therefore, House Bill 1435 violates Article 23 of the
Maryland Declaration of Rights by depriving a person of his liberty
and freedom of locomotion without due process; violates the First
and Fourteenth Amendments of the United States Constitution as it
arbitrarily deprives a person of hi