Gary Novosielski

If in fact action has already been taken as a result of the passage of the original motion, then it is not possible to use the motions to Rescind or Amend Something Previously Adopted. Those motions can be used to change or reverse a decision taken previously, but only to the extent that the motion has not yet been fully carried out. So it will depend on the details of the particular case. For example, if the motion was to paint the clubhouse red, and the paint had not yet been purchased, it would be in order at the next meeting to move to amend that motion to change red to green. The motions to Rescind or Amend Something Previously Adopted are covered in Section 35, and "require (a) a two-thirds vote, (b) a majority vote when notice of intent to make the motion, stating the complete substance of the proposed change, has been given at the previous meeting within a quarterly time interval or in the call of the present meeting, or (c) a vote of a majority of the entire membership—any one of which will suffice."

There is no such statement in RONR. In fact, the contrary is true: if a ruling of the chair is appealed, then the outcome of that vote, whether to sustain or to overrule, is the decision of the assembly. If it is not appealed, it is simply the decision of the chair.

This is a confusing, ambiguous, and regionally variant "feature" (read: bug) of American English. The pronouns, with/for and the order of the two things to be substituted one for the other, are not fixed in their meanings. I discovered this on moving from NJ to PA, when my attempts at a restaurant to substitute a bowl of soup for a salad were having the opposite of their intended effect.

No. During a roll-call vote, a member may respond Pass, but that will only postpone his vote until all the other names have been called. If he does not vote by the time the roll call is over, he will have abstained. There's no way to delay until next week.

In which case it would be Roberts's Rules

You bet. And if your bylaws are fairly typical, it's the general membership who adopts bylaws in the first place, and who is authorized to amend them (for example, to fix those conflicting provisions). Boards are not superior bodies, they are subordinate to the general membership, and have only such powers as are granted to them by the membership in the bylaws.

Yes, I'll grant you that. That's a comfortable distance away from the Board having final authority to determine what bylaws amendments the membership is permitted to consider.

It could but it's a bit distasteful. If it's a true majority, they'll have no trouble defeating troublesome amendments. There's no need to deprive others of their rights in order to get their way. Democracy doesn't mean you always get what you want. But you usually have a better chance of getting what you want by thoughtful debate than by parliamentary trickery.

Once again, in a typical organization, the general membership is the body authorized to consider changes to the bylaws. The Board would have no role. Since the organization appointed the committee, it reports to the organization, not the board. If the Board appointed the committee, I would have to ask why, since the bylaws are outside their area of responsibility. Your bylaws may vary.

I am still not able to edit that message, but I could edit the one where I noted that I couldn't edit the other. Hmm. I don't like that sentence.

The only "ethical" way to prevent someone from being elected is to vote for someone else. Even if her nomination were withdrawn (which would have to be voluntary on her part) she could still be elected by write-in votes. I'm not sure what you mean by "the nominations were approved" at the April meeting. If the rules in RONR apply, nominations require no approval, nor even a second. And after the report of the nominating committee is read, the chair must ask for additional nominations from the floor. If this was not done in April, it must be done prior to the election at the May meeting. And even if it was done in April and no nominations from the floor were made, a motion to reopen nominations at the May meeting is still in order.

Maybe. Is this a hypothetical, or did this actually occur? If it did, what did the chair announce as the result of the election, and was any point of order raised at the time? I don't believe the fact that write-ins were not allowed would affect the result, however (though I still wonder what would prohibit them). Whether the four votes were invalid or were counted as valid votes for one or more other candidates, the number required to elect would still be 12.

The question was not about people ineligible to vote, but about voters who cast votes for people ineligible to receive votes. In this case I believe the ballots would be included in the total, and would affect the number needed to elect.

Exactly what sort of "board" is this? Is it an elected public body or commission? If so, sunshine laws will certainly apply, which vary somewhat from state to state. So it may be that if a quorum of board members meets anywhere, an official meeting is presumed, which could carry with it certain notice requirements and other rules governing what is a properly called meeting. This does not necessarily mean the board must conduct business other than providing information, but it may well be considered an official meeting. But specific answers to legal questions are beyond the scope of this forum, and getting a clear answer to your question might well require consulting an attorney familiar with the applicable regulations.

This is odd. If the organization does not wish to amend the motion, nothing forces it to do so. And if a member moves an amendment that (a majority of) the organization does not approve of, it will not vote to agree to the amendment. However, I presume that as the rules may be suspended in order to agree to a motion without debate or amendment, they could also be suspended to allow a motion to be considered with debate but without amendment. A motion of this form could be used: I move to suspend the rules and consider, without amendments, the following resolution: "Resolved, That ..." (Second.) It would require a 2/3 vote to agree to that motion, and if passed, the resolution could be debated, adopted (presumably by a majority vote), defeated, referred, postponed, etc., but not amended. If a 2/3 vote to suspend the rules was not achieved, the resolution could be considered in the normal way and amended in the normal manner. But this would simply mean that the organization did not, in fact, wish to prevent amendments. After all, who is the "organization" if not the membership?

I have tried to edit the message above, but the Edit link is inoperative. Interestingly, I can edit this message, but still can't edit the one above. Hovering over its Edit link does not change the mouse pointer from an arrow to a pointing finger as it does here.

But why? If the rules in RONR apply, the Nominating Committee reports to the general membership, not to the Board. The Board has only those powers granted to it by the membership in the bylaws. So the Board would have no authority to approve or disapprove of the work of the Nominating Committee. Elections are the business of the membership; the Board ordinarily has no say in the workings of an election, especially if the election is of their own members. It is not uncommon for Boards to come to believe that they are a body superior to the membership, with the power to determine what the members may see, do, and vote on. In fact, under the rules of RONR, it is exactly the opposite. The Board is a subordinate body which must carry out the will of the membership. A careful reading of your bylaws may change any of the above default conditions, but from the samples presented I don't see any rule that the Board may insert itself into the electoral process. That doesn't mean there is none, however.

Why would that need to be placed in the bylaws? Can't any assembly create ad hoc committees?

If by interesting you mean erroneous, I have to admit there's another way to read it. But if the OPs rules say it is so "per RONR" I would not quarrel with the fact that it is true "per RONR". And the society would be free to adopt such a requirement even if RONR was silent on the issue.

Well, it says they "usually" are seated separately, but it's not exactly a rule in RONR. It may be a rule in your rulebook.

In my view, a member who casts a secret ballot has waived his right to have his dissent recorded.

To remove the president from office, since your bylaws contain the wording "or until", takes a majority vote with previous notice, a 2/3 vote without previous notice, or a vote of a majority of the entire membership, any of which will suffice. See http://www.robertsrules.com/faq.html#20 for details.

Well, it seems to me that the question of what to do if no rules were violated does not have applicability here as, if the rules had been followed, there would be no discrepancy. I think the membership (not the board) has the power to declare the election (or that portion of it which has questionable results) to be null and void, presuming the results have not yet been announced, and order a re-vote. But I also think that the membership has the power to accept the results in spite of the discrepancy. But it can only do either of these things at a regular or properly called meeting at which a quorum is present, which you say never happens. Are you certain that a meeting announced for this specific purpose would still not secure a quorum? In other circumstances, the membership could also declare certain specific ballots invalid but, if I understand the situation, there is no reasonable way to tell the allegedly invalid ballots from the valid ones. The quorum seems to be the sticking point here, and I don't see a way around it. If the rules in RONR apply, the membership is the final authority on any questions of election validity, but without a proper quorate meeting, decisions can't be made.

There's a difference between revoting and recounting. A recount just means counting the same ballots again. That doesn't seem to be what you're asking about. I don't think you've made clear exactly what was wrong with the ballots, what are these signatures you speak of, and what your bylaws said was wrong with the situation.

No, a vote is not proper. The only way to object to final approval of the minutes is to offer a correction. Once no (further) corrections are offered, the minutes stand approved (as read/printed/corrected). Votes may be necessary on individual corrections if there is not unanimous consent to agree to the correction. Corrections are treated exactly like a proposed amendment to the secretary's draft minutes. If not agreed to by general consent, a majority vote is required to agree to them.