The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1937-03-04
These Unicameral Legislatures

had obtained sufficient signatures to
petition to get the question on the bal
lot. The charter amendment won by a
vote of 69,017 to 32,441. A new Coun-
Gil was elected in the spring at the
same time Mayor Jackson was elected.
Members of the old, branch
Council had received $1,000 a year
each. The new Councilman received
$1,000 a year. In the last full year
of the bicameral Council, the total cost
of the body was SCI, 1850. In the first
full year of the single-chamber Coun-
ell the cost was $47,3OO, or $17,95O
less than in 1922. However, in 1928
the salary of the President was boosted
from $4,000 to $4,000, an office of vice
president created and one member of
the Council at $4,000, and the other
seventeen members of the Council were
raised from $1,000 to $500. This
boosted the total cost of the Council
by $4,000, and made the 1928 budget
$4,000. The 1887 budget for the
Council was $74,5OO.
&&*
On the matter of relative costs of
unicameral and bicameral bodies, how
ever, it was remarked at City Hall that
since 1922 the business of the city of
Baltimore has multiplied tremendous
ly, and the duties and responsibilities
of Councilmen multiplied accordingly.
If the city still had the two branches
of the Council, the members probably
would be receiving increased salaries,
so that it cannot be said, offhand, that
the present single chamber is, relative
ly, a more costly body than the old
two chambers.
One of the arguments advanced in
favor of the unicameral plan in Ne
braska was that it would save the State
money. The old Legislature cost
$106,400 year. The new body-offi-
cially named the Nebraska State Sem
ate-has forty-three members who
are paid 1912 a year, or S1,544 for
their two-year term. The total cost
of the new Legislature has been esti-
mated at $4,000. 1t has been urged
that with smaller, more compact,
single-house Legislature the State can
afford to pay legislators more attrac-
tive salaries and draw thereby more
competent men into the public service.
##~
But most of the opponents of the
unicameral idea scoff at this money
saving idea, saying that to attract the
highest caliber of men available in the
State compensation would have to be
raised to a prohibitive level. One OBJ
lection to the traditional bicameral
legislative body is that the sessions are
always being interfered with because
members have to go back home at fire.
quent intervals to attend to their per-
sonal business. Usually long week
end is taken-from Friday night to
Monday highland this, say the uni
cameral advocates, delays public bust
ness. Save in few States the COM
pensation of legislators is nothing to
brag about. Maryland pays SIS day;
Connecticut, So; Kansas, So; South
Carolina, 81; Florida, Sc; Georgia, ST.;
Colorado, $40; Virginia, SIP; West
Virginia, SIT; Massachusetts, $40;
New York, $25; and Illinois, $35.
***
One of the favorite arguments of
the unicameral advocates is that a
smaller, more compact body can handle
Legislation with less delay, with more
thorough understanding, and with
less friction. And anyhow, they
argue, most of the work of
bicameral bodies is done by relative
ly few committees, with the remainder
of the two bodies accepting their judg-
ment without even so much as reading
the bills presented.
But the adherents of the bicameral
Legislative system contend that each
house acts as check upon the other,
and thus prevents hasty, ill-considered
legislation. The classical argument
on behalf of the bicameral legislature
was expressed by Joseph Story in his
Commentaries on the Constitution of
the United States" Story said:
"The value of a distribution of the
legislative power between two BRAN
ches, each possessing negative upon
the other, may be summed up under
the following head: it operates direct
ly as security against hasty, rash, or
dangerous legislation, and allows err
rors and mistakes to be corrected be-
fore they have produced any public
mischief; it is far less easy to deceive,
or corrupt, or persuade two bodies into
a course subversive to the public good
than it is one"
But Senator Norris, out of his wide
practical knowledge of legislative
bodies, declares that two houses out
of their jealousy often obstruct need
lessly the passage Of imperatively re-
quired legislation and that as often as
not they fail to block bad legislation.