Gary Novosielski

It doesn't sound like the motion was validly phrased, based on your question. Motions should be drafted so as to propose a yes/no question. What was the exact language of the motion in this case? When the vote on the motion is a tie, the result is the same as if everyone voted No. But it sounds like No wasn't one of the choices; hence, the problem.

Please enter your new question as a New Topic.

In this particular case, adding it to the bylaws would be vastly preferable, since neither appointing committees nor authorizing the board are actions that are allowed without a quorum.

According to RONR, neither debate nor voting are allowed by e-mail. So if either or both are allowed in your organization, that would have to be in your bylaws.

Well, you can certainly resign, but whether you get appointed to the unexpired remainder of the two-year term depends on whether the president nominates you, and the board approves.

Any member may move to amend the budget while it is being considered. It doesn't have to be a director.

If the terms of office are stated in the bylaws, then the only valid way to change those terms is with a bylaws amendment. Any other action that purports to change the bylaws is null and void.

A tie vote is less than a majority, so the motion is defeated.

No. The only two ways to vote are Yes or No. Of course the member may also abstain. Since this is an individual vote, I presume that this is taking place in the context of a roll-call vote. In that case the dialog might take place as follows: Secretary: Mr. Adams? Mr. Adams: Yes, with reservations. Secretary: Mr. Adams--Yes. Ms. Brown? And so on... The fact that Mr. Adams may have reservations about his vote is of no parliamentary significance. If Mr. Adams believed that his reservations were of any wider interest than to himself alone, the time to bring them up would have been during debate, not during the voting process.

After the nominating committee's report is made at the meeting, the chair must call for nominations from the floor. To be clear, this includes all positions, not only those that the nominating committee failed to report on, but also those that they did nominate.

The bylaws appear to provide that the board, as that's what it appears to be, holds an "organizational" meeting after the AGM, at which the election has presumably taken place, in order to organize itself, which typically includes at least election of officers. There are board members, they just haven't decided who will do what. Whenever they get their act together and hold a meeting, that will be their organizational meeting. The fact that no officers were yet selected does not mean the board cannot meet. Any member may call the meeting to order and preside over an election of a chair pro-tem and they're off and running..

If I understand correctly, the AGM elected a board, and the board was supposed to meet immediately afterwards (organizational meeting) to elect officers from among its own number, but failed to do so. It seems to me they should do so as soon as practicable.

Unless the bylaws expressly give the board the power to suspend provisions in the bylaws, they can't. When a board is given the authority to act on behalf of the organization (typically between meetings of the general assembly of organization) it is assumed that those decisions will not conflict with the bylaws. The bylaws can only be changed by the authorized body and according to the prescribed procedure set out in the bylaws for their own amendment.

Rather than moving to Adjourn, a motion at the final meeting of the committee to Rise and Report is certainly appropriate. If the committee keeps minutes (not typically the case) the motion would be recorded there.

It should have been obvious that procedures were not being followed at the meeting, as soon as the president failed to follow them. If, as it appears, nobody raised a Point of Order at the time, there's no evident basis in the rules in RONR for overturning the election at this point, I concur with Mr. H. Your bylaws on nominations appear, to this non-member at least, to contain unnecessary layers of complexity. Only your organization can decide whether your custom rules actually solve problems that aren't adequately addressed by the default rules in RONR itself, but I think it's a question worth asking.

It is sufficient to list the main motion (as amended, if amended) and the outcome. The mover's name should be recorded, but not the seconder. What is this motion to "suspend debate" of which you speak, and how does it differ from a motion for the previous question?

What ought to happen is that someone raises a point of order that the chair failed to announce the result of the previous vote.

But if a majority voted No on suspending the rules, then we have not (somehow) decided to vote on (and pass) all the pending motions at once, and so everything that was pending remains pending.

According to my dictionary, a duty may be a moral (i.e., ethical) obligation, or a legal (e.g., parliamentary) requirement. If one does not think it is the right thing to do, but it is required by the rules, it is a duty. But if it is not required by the rules, yet one believes that it is one's ethical responsibility, it is also a duty.

Strictly speaking, the Nominating Committee does not vote for a person to be in a position; it votes on a person to be nominated, which often equates to be on the ballot. Since the committee does not typically report to the board (but rather to the general membership), the board has no authority (or opportunity) to change the report of the NomCom. However, after the report is made to the membership (typically at the annual meeting), the chair must call for additional nominations from the floor, which any member present (even those who are also board members) may offer. But note that these are additional nominations, and do not remove or replace anyone already nominated.

I agree that such motions, if offered as a block, must be divided on the demand of a single member. They may be "related" in subject matter, but whether Alice Brown, or Charles Dumont should be hired as an administrator are clearly two separate and independent questions.

In my view, all and not all have different meanings.

Well, I think voting by e-mail would involve (and violate) one.

The phrase "2/3 majority" is not to be found in RONR. A motion may require a majority vote, or a 2/3 vote, but not both.

In your original post, you called it a motion to Postpone Indefinitely, which essentially kills the motion if it passes, but we're not clear that it did pass. Now you're calling it a motion to Postpone until the next AGM (i.e., to a definite time) . Such a motion cannot be used to postpone longer than a quarterly time interval, so this would not be in order. Earlier you suggested that the intent of the motion was to refer the matter to the board, which would be a motion to Commit/Refer. Without knowing what motion was actually made, and how it was disposed of, it's difficult to advise you on whether it was properly handled and, if not, whether it is too late to do anything about it.