The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1909-02-02
THE MINORITY REPORT
Cities Should Not Yield Rights Wrung With Difficulty from the General
 Assembly.

To the Honorable Common COunc1l of the City of Bridgeport. Gentlemen: The undersigned was appointed by the Common Council a member of a special committee to consider certain revisions of the charter of the City of Bridgeport.
 He has in part performed the duties entrusted to him. and begs leave to re- port as follows:
 Upon the occasion when the commit tee was authorized by the Council. a resolution was introduced, which reads as follows:
 Resolved. That it is the sense
 of the Common Council of the
 City of Bridgeport that no
 charter amendment should be
 proposed to the General As
 sembly with the approval of
 this body, unless there is in- a
 cluded with the said proposed
 amendments provision for
 their submission to the voters;
 and it is further the sense of
 the Common Council that means
 should be taken by which the
 General Assembly may be ap-
 prised from time to time that in
 the opinion of the Common
 Council no amendment should
 be made to the charter of the
 city without a provision for it's
 submission.
 
 adopted by the Council at it's meeting held Sept. 8. 1908.
 Tn my opinion this order of the Coun- cil was virtually an instruction to the committee to submit no amendments to our fundamental law unless the same were made in the idea that they should not become effective without the con- sent of the voters.
 In accordance with the order of the Council, I introduced at meeting of the committee, two resolutions either of which would give effect to the will of the Council.
 The first resolution retained Section 149 Of the present charter. which is the same under which that instrument was submitted to the people and approved. It is the form customarily added by the legislature itselfs and is blanket affair, which demands that the pro- posed changes be passed upon as whole.
 To this customary procedure. already followed many times in the history of the city, objection was made by Mayor Lee, that the amendments about to be proposed contained some changes of minor importance. which the voters would not care to bother with.
 To meet this objection a resolution was offered which in substance pro- yides that any of the amendments passed shall not become operative un- til 90 days after their passage. It was further provided that whenever within the 90 days five per cent. of the voters should petition to. the Common Coun- ci! for the submission of any parts or sections contained in the said amend ments, that the parts or sections so petitioned upon should not become ef- fective until voted upon.' For this resolution three votes were cast in the negative. and three in the affirmative. Messrs Cullinan. Tague and Morris sey voted for. and Messrs. Lee. Wilson and Primrose against. Thereupon Mayor Lee declared the resolution lest. It is submitted for the consideration 1f the Council that under it's own reso- 1 ution it can favor no charter amend ] ment, nor ask the legislature to make | any unless the legislature is also ask l ed to provide means by which the vot- l ers shall have a voice in making the | aws under which they are to live. The right of referendum has been | obtained from the General Assembly | through years of hard struggle on the | part of the cities of the state.
 Such right once gained should not ]