646 THE CHANCELLOR'S CASE.

salary of star hundred and fifty pounds per annum during the con-
tinuance of his commission. The appropriation, or provision made
for the payment of this salary is to be found in the third section of
this act, and is expressed in these words; " the said salaries shall
be paid quarterly, out of the supplies raised every year, until the
General Assembly shall make other provision for payment; and the
said salaries, for the ensuing year, shall be paid out of the arrearages
of taxes due for the year seventeen hundred and eighty-five." By
the act of 1792, ch. 76, it was declared, " that the chancellor shall
be entitled to receive, far all duties and services whatever, prescribed,
or to be prescribed by law, an annual salary of nine hundred and
fifty pounds current money, during the continuance of his commis-
sion, to be paid quarterly. By the four last sections of this act,
an appropriation or provision was made for the payment of that
salary out of a particular fund, to be raised by taxes on proceed-
ings in chancery and the land office, and money arising from the
sale of vacant land; which was to be specially set apart for that
purpose. This appropriation, or special fund was temporary, and
limited to five years, was continued, by the act of 1797, ch. 51,
for seuen years longer; and was then virtually applied to general
purposes, by operation of the act of 1798, ch. 86, and expressly
so applied by the acts of 1804, ch. 64 and 108. By a resolution
passed at November session, 1796, an addition of two hundred
dollars was made to the chancellor's salary for the ensuing year.(£)

(£) On running the eye over the acts and titles of acts passed by the General
Assembly under the provincial government of Maryland, in Bacon's revision, it
cannot but strike the attention of every one how large a proportion of them, even
those of the most important character, were limited in their operation to a specified
period of time, and that too, of a very short duration. This temporary mode of
legislation must have been attended with very considerable inconvenience. But it
appears to have been resorted to by the colonists as the only means of defending their
rights and interests against the undue exercise of the royal and proprietary preroga-
tives. It will be recollected, that any act, after it had been passed by the General
Assembly, however beneficial or necessary to the people, might be annulled by being
dissented from by the lord proprietary or by the king; and therefore, to keep the
proprietary or the king within reach of the people and dependent upon them by
rendering it necessary to convene their representatives at short intervals to reenact
or continue laws necessary for the support of the government; (7 Mass. His. Sod. 129;)
and to extract irom the proprietary or king the assent to new laws which might be called
for by the people, it was deemed expedient, by the General Assembly, to limit their
legislative enactments to a very short duration. Indeed it is said, that some of the
colonial General Assemblies, in order to preserve their independence of the king, had
done almost every act of legislation, by votes or orders, even to the repealing the effects
of acts, suspending establishments of pay, paying services, doing chancery and other
judicatory business, &c. having their effect without being reduced to the form of