the injurious effects to said Company of rival competition by other Internal Improvement Companies. They shall require the Directors of all said Public Works to guard the public interest and prevent the establishment of tolls which shall discriminate against the interest of the citizens or products of this State, and from time to time, and as often as there shall be any change in the rates of toll on any of the said Works, to furnish the said Board of Public Works a schedule of such modified rates of toll, and so adjust them as to promote the agricultural interests of the State; they shall report to the General Assembly at each regular session and recommend such legislation as they may deem necessary and requisite to promote or protect the interests of the State in the said Public Works; they shall perform such other duties as may hereafter prescribed by Law; and a majority of them shall be competent to act. The Governor, Comptroller and Treasurer shall receive no additional salary for services rendered by them as members of the Board of Public Works. The provisions of the Act of the General Assembly of Maryland of the year 1867, chapter 359, are hereby declared null and void.

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SEC. 3. The Board of Public Works is hereby authorized to ex-change the State's interest as Stockholder and Creditor in the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company for an equal amount of the bonds or registered debt now owing by the State, to the extent only of all the preferred stock of the State on which the State is entitled to only six per cent. interest, provided such exchange shall not be made at less than par, nor less than the market value of said stock; and the said Board is authorized, subject to such regulations and conditions as the General Assembly may from time to time prescribe, to sell the State's interest in the other Works of Internal Improvement, whether as a Stockholder or a Creditor, and also the State's interest in any banking corporation, receiving in payment the bonds and registered debt now owing by the State, equal in amount to the price obtained for the State's said interest; provided, that the interest of the State in the Washington Branch of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad be reserved and excepted from sale; and provided further, that no sale or contract of sale of the State's interest in the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal, the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal, and the Susquehanna and Tide-water Canal Companies shall go into effect: until the same shall be ratified by the ensuing General Assembly.

ARTICLE XIII.

NEW COUNTIES.

SECTION 1. The General Assembly may provide, by Law, for organizing new Counties, locating and removing county seats, and changing county lines; but no new county shall be organized without the consent of the majority of the legal voters residing within the limits proposed to be formed into said new county; and whenever a new county shall be proposed to be formed out of portions of two or more Counties, the consent of a majority of the legal voters of such part of each of said counties, respectively, shall be required; nor shall the lines of any county be changed without the consent of a majority of the legal voters, residing within the district, which, under said proposed change, would form a part of a county different from that to which it belonged prior to said change; and no new county shall contain less than four hundred square miles, nor less than ten thousand white Inhabitants; nor shall any change be made in the limits of any county, whereby the population of said county would be reduced to less than ten thousand white Inhabitants, or its territory reduced to less than four hundred square miles.

State v. Manly, 1 Md. 139. Eichelberger v. Hardesty, 15 Md. 549. School: Comm'rs of Wicomico Co. v. School Comm'rs of Worcester Co., 35 Md. 201.

SEC. 2. At the election to be held for the adoption, or rejection of this Constitution, in each Election District, in those parts of Worcester and Somerset Counties, comprised within the following limits, viz: Beginning at the point, where Mason and Dixon's line crosses the channel of Pocomoke River, thence following said line to the channel of the Nanticoke River, thence with the channel of said river to Tangier Sound, or the intersection of Nanticoke and Wicomico Rivers, thence up the channel of the Wicomico River to the mouth of Wicomico Creek, thence with the channel of said creek and Passerdyke Creek to Dashield's, or Disharoon's Mills, thence with the mill-pond of said mills and Branch following the middle prong of said Branch, to Meadow Bridge, on the road, dividing the Counties of Somerset and Worcester, near the southwest corner of the farm of William. P. Morris, thence due east to the Pocomoke River, thence with

the channel of said river to the beginning, the Judges of election, in each of said Districts, shall receive the ballots of each elector, voting at said election, who has resided for six months, preceding said election within said limits, for or against a new County; and the Return Judges of said Election Districts shall certify the result of such voting, in the manner, now prescribed by Law, to the Governor, who shall by Proclamation make known the same; and if a majority of the legal votes, cast within that part of Worcester county, contained within said lines, and also a majority of the legal votes cast within that part of Somerset County, contained within said lines, shall be in favor of a new County, then said parts of Worcester and Somerset Counties shall become and constitute a new County, to be called Wicomico County; and Salisbury shall be the County seat. And the Inhabitants thereof shall thenceforth have and enjoy all such rights and privileges as are held and enjoyed by the Inhabitants of the other Counties of this State.

SEC. 3. When said new County shall have been so created, the Inhabitants thereof shall cease to have any claim to, or interest in the county buildings, and other public property of every description, belonging to said Counties of Somerset and Worcester, respectively, and shall be liable for their proportionate shares of the then existing debts and obligations of the said Counties, according to the last assessment in said Counties, to be ascertained and apportioned by the Circuit Court for Somerset County, as to the debts and obligations of said County, and by the Circuit Court for Worcester County, on the debts and obligations of Worcester County, on the petition of the County Commissioners of the said Counties, respectively; and the property in each part of the said Counties, included in said new County, shall be bound only for the share of the debts and obligations of the county from which it shall be separated; and the Inhabitants of said new county shall also pay the County taxes, levied upon them at the time of the creation of such new County, as if such new County had not been created; and on the application of twelve citizens of the proposed county of Wicomico, the Surveyor of Worcester County shall run and locate the line from Meadow Bridge to the Pocomoke River, previous to the adoption, or

rejection of this Constitution, and at the expense of said petitioners.

SEC. 4. At the first general election, held under this Constitution, the qualified voters of said new County shall be entitled to elect a Senator, and two Delegates to the General Assembly, and all such County, or other officers as this Constitution may authorize, or require to be elected by other Counties of the State; a. notice of such election shall be given by the Sheriffs of Worcester and Somerset Counties in the manner now prescribed by Law; and in case said new County shall be established, as aforesaid, then the Counties of Somerset and Worcester shall be entitled to elect but two Delegates each to the General Assembly.

SEC. 5. The County of Wicomico, if formed according to the provisions of this Constitution, shall be embraced in the First Judicial Circuit; and the times for holding the Courts therein shall be fixed and determined by the General Assembly.

SEO. 6. The General Assembly shall pass all such Laws as may be necessary more fully to carry into effect the provisions of this. Article.

ARTICLE XIV.

AMENDMENTS TO THE CONSTITUTION.

SECTION 1. The General Assembly may propose Amendments to this Constitution; provided, that each Amendment shall be embraced in a separate Bill, embodying the Article or Section, as the same will stand when amended and passed by three-fifths of all the members elected to each of the two Houses, by yeas and nays, to be entered on the Journals with the proposed Amendment. The Bill, or Bills, proposing amendment, or amendments, shall be published by order of the Governor, in at least two newspapers in each county, where so many may be published, and where not more than one may be published, then in that newspaper, and in three newspapers published in the City of Baltimore, one of which shall be in the German language, once a week, for at least three months preceding the next ensuing

general election, at which the said proposed amendment, or amendments shall be submitted, in a form to be prescribed by the General Assembly, to the qualified voters of the State for adoption or rejection. The votes cast for and against said proposed amendment, or amendments, severally, shall be returned to the Governor, in the manner prescribed in other cases, and if it shall appear to the Governor that a majority of the votes cast at said election on said amendment, or amendments, severally, were cast in favor thereof, the Governor shall, by his Proclamation, declare the said amendment, or amendments, having received said majority of votes, to have been adopted by the People of Maryland as part of the Constitution thereof, and thenceforth said amendment, or amendments shall be part of the said Constitution. When two or more amendments shall be submitted, in manner aforesaid, to the voters of this State at the same election, they shall be so submitted as that each amendment shall be voted on separately.

SEC. 2. It shall be the duty of the General Assembly to provide by Law for taking, at the general election to be held in the year eighteen hundred and eighty-seven, and every twenty years thereafter, the sense of the People in regard to calling a Convention for altering this Constitution; and if a majority of voters at such election or elections shall vote for a Convention, the General Assembly, at its next session, shall provide by Law for the assembling of such Convention, and for the election of Delegates thereto. Each County, and Legislative District of the City of Baltimore, shall have in such Convention a number of Delegates equal to its representation in both Houses at the time. at which the Convention is called. But any Constitution, or change, or amendment of the existing Constitution, which may be adopted by such Convention, shall be submitted to the voters of this State, and shall have no effect unless the same shall have been adopted by a majority of the voters voting thereon.

ARTICLE XV.

MISCELLANEOUS.

SECTION 1. Every person holding any office created by, or existing under the Constitution, or Laws of the State, (except