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Suggestive bylaw....can the word "should" be in bylaws


Guest Jodie

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My organization has a bylaw that states that to be nominated for a specific position, the nominee "should" have previously served in a specific different office.  I contend that a bylaw must be definitive and not suggestive...Either the nominee must have previously served in a specific office, or this section should be removed.  Thoughts?

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7 hours ago, Daniel H. Honemann said:

What point of order? What has happened?

A person is nominated for specific position x, without having served in specific position y.  The  bylaws say that, to be nominated for x, a person should have served in y.  A point of order is raised.  Should the chair rule that the nomination is in order, or out of order?

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1 hour ago, Joshua Katz said:

A person is nominated for specific position x, without having served in specific position y.  The  bylaws say that, to be nominated for x, a person should have served in y.  A point of order is raised.  Should the chair rule that the nomination is in order, or out of order?

It looks like a "should" rule to me, so I would rule the point of order not well taken.  Ultimately, it is a matter of bylaws interpretation.  I agree with Greg Goodwiller's post and would interpret that particular "should" rule as being advisory in nature.  Others might disagree.  That's what appeals from the ruling of the chair are for. :)

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16 hours ago, Richard Brown said:

It looks like a "should" rule to me, so I would rule the point of order not well taken.  Ultimately, it is a matter of bylaws interpretation.  I agree with Greg Goodwiller's post and would interpret that particular "should" rule as being advisory in nature.  Others might disagree.  That's what appeals from the ruling of the chair are for. :)

I agree that it's a should rule, but what's the point of having a bylaw that has no effect?

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2 hours ago, Joshua Katz said:

I agree that it's a should rule, but what's the point of having a bylaw that has no effect?

It doesn't have no effect; it encourages them to do what it proposes that they should do.

(I concede that's idiotic. Or imbecilic -- I can never remember the distinction between these terms of art in a field I'm unfamiliar with. That's not what bylaws are for.  That's where "should" statements should appear in a Mission Statement or whatever.   And that's why bylaws are called bylaws, not by-feel-goods (see Index, and that's not the finger I'm thinking of).  The bylaws should say whether a [I'm gonna paraphrase, the software punches me in the soft bits] ...

On 5/27/2017 at 9:44 AM, Guest Jodie said:

nominee shall have previously served in a specific different office

... , or not at all.

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23 hours ago, Richard Brown said:

It looks like a "should" rule to me, so I would rule the point of order not well taken.  Ultimately, it is a matter of bylaws interpretation.  I agree with Greg Goodwiller's post and would interpret that particular "should" rule as being advisory in nature.  Others might disagree.  That's what appeals from the ruling of the chair are for. :)

I'll disagree only slightly and say that it is up to the society to make the determination. 

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I should (!) emphasize that the meaning of the word "should" is not nailed down.  In RONR (and elsewhere), it sometimes is used to propose advice, but some other times it just plain tells you what to do, period, which is what a "rule" does.  I opine that the term "should rule" is oxymoronic (no offense meant to those oxies of my acquaintance).

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23 hours ago, Richard Brown said:

That's what appeals from the ruling of the chair are for. :)

O Richard, our first quarrel.  No, that's not what appeals are for.  Appeals are for correcting errors by the chair.  If the chair gets it right (and if the assembly recognizes this), there will be no appeals.

I' m reminded of something from the early days of this website, when there was a sub-forum called something like "Ask The A-Team."  Dr Stackpole and Mr Honemann might remember it; if you're under 80 years old, it was before your time (even I was just a little kid then, and Shmuel Gerber and George Mervosh were even younger).  So, someone asked, Our bylaws say you have to attend at least six of the monthly meetings per year to sustain your membership, so here it's the beginning of October, so does anyone who has not attended at least three meetings so far this year automatically lose his or her membership (by ineluctable arithmetic), or do we have to wait until New Year's Eve to throw them out?  The reply, memorably (which is why I remember it, duhh) began, "Sometimes bylaws are aspirational in nature ...."

Not the first or last time I sat dumbstruck, limbs unmoving, mouth agape, eyes glazed, staring at the computer screen (though more often it's when looking at a different kind of website), but yeah, it was impressive (at least to me, inasmuch as I was impressed, duhh*).  Kind of winking at the sense of the sentence in RONR, 11th Ed., spanning p. 589 - 590.

________

* Dan Seabold pronounces "duhh" as "Q. E. D."

 

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