4008

VETOES

which the Court is unwilling to adopt?

Article IV, Section 18A, of the Maryland
Constitution provides, inter alia, that

"The Court of Appeals from time to time shall make
rules and regulations to revise the practice and
procedure in and the administration of the appellate
courts and in the other courts of this State, which
shall have the force of law until rescinded, changed
or modified by the Court of Appeals or otherwise by
law."

It is clear, under this section of the Constitution,
that the General Assembly may, if it wishes, enact
statutes which alter Roles adopted by the Court, or which
create or affect procedures in the handling of court
cases independent of the existence or absence of such
Rules. See Southerland v. Norris, 74 Md. 326;
Richardson v. Richardson, 217 Md. 316 (1958); Hensley v.
Bethesda Metal Co., 230 Md. 556 (1963); Funger v. Mayor
of Somerset. 244 Md. 151 (1966). Thus, if the
Legislature desired to abolish the hearsay rule, in whole
or in part, there would seem to be no constitutional
infirmity in its doing so by enacting a statute to that
effect.

What the Legislature has done here, however, is not
to legislate a new rule of evidence, but to require that
the Court of Appeals do so by rule. The bill does not,
therefore, represent an exercise of permissible
legislative discretion, but, in effect, a curtailment of
the constitutionally based discretion of the Court of
Appeals in the promulgation of its own rules.

Article 8 of the Declaration of Rights provides, in
part, that "the Legislative, Executive and Judicial
powers of Government ought to be forever separate and
distinct from each other." This provision has been part
of our Constitution since 1776, and has always been
regarded as one of the cornerstones of our political
system. The Court of Appeals, in the early case of
Bright v. Wright. 2 Md. 429 (1852) noted that the evident
purpose of the separation of powers clause was

"to parcel out and separate the powers of
government, and to confide particular classes
of them to particular branches of the supreme
authority. That is to say, such of them as
are judicial in their character to the
judiciary; such as are legislative to the
legislature, and such as are executive in
nature to the executive. Within the
particular limits assigned to each, they are
supreme and uncontrollable." (emphasis