Gary Novosielski

No, a member need not be present. The member who was willing to be nominated acted quite properly by supplying the letter. I'm mildly shocked by the fact that after the chair was completely unable to support his claim after referring to the founding documents, and RONR, nobody apparently thought to Appeal [§24] from the decision of the chair, and put the matter to a vote. The chair does not have the powers of a dictator. Rulings are ultimately decided by the assembly. "Find out just what any people will quietly submit to and you have found out the exact measure of injustice and wrong which will be imposed upon them." --Frederick Douglass

It may not be relevant, but a vote of 14 - 8 does not amount to a 2/3 vote, if that was indeed the requirement.

I'm also of the view that the assembly can't delegate power to do this, if the bylaws are that specific. But like any motion to do anything, the assembly could refer the matter to a committee for buffing and polishing before acting on, amending, or ignoring its recommendations, which would be in the nature of nominations

I'd leave off the illegal votes, since there weren't any. The business about one vote needed to elect is only true in the case that there is but one vote cast (or no votes cast) . If one vote is cast, a majority is one, since one is the smallest integer more than one half of one. In that case, one vote is needed to elect, and the candidate is elected. If no votes are cast, the smallest integer more than half of zero is still one, so again, one vote is needed to elect, but in this case, a majority was not reached, and so nobody is elected. The abstentions are not counted as votes, and don't raise the number needed to elect, but you've clearly got that point right. Good luck.

I think the meeting would fall under the "subsequent meeting" instructions, but they refer back to the rule that applies to the first meeting, so it appears that two members are sufficient to call a meeting if the chair fails to call one. Whether the chair "failed" or not is, I think, up to the committee to decide, unless overruled by the parent body. If a meeting is improperly called, it is not a valid meeting, and nothing done is valid, but the most likely way that would happen in this scenario is if the two people calling the meeting failed to send notice of the meeting to all committee members.

There should be no "Yes" or "No" votes in an election. If the vote was by ballot, that ballot would contain the names of those nominated, with space for write-in votes. I don't believe so. I would treat them as not indicating a preference, which RONR advises that the tellers should ignore; But stay tuned for other opinions.

...and certainly are not a record of what occurred after the meeting.

The votes of individuals are not reflected in the minutes unless the vote was a Roll-Call vote, which would be highly unusual in the case of an election. In the usual case, where elections are carried out by ballot vote, the votes of members are secret, and could not be included in the minutes because they are unknown. And in any case, it is not possible to vote for nobody. The only way to vote against a candidate is to vote for someone else. Votes that do not express a preference for any candidate are treated as abstentions, and deemed to acquiesce in the decision reached by a majority of those voting. What does go in the minutes is the Teller's Report.

It may be a stretch. What if the chair instructed the secretary to read it? In any case, I think it's safe to say that if the member wishes to assert her right to participate in debate, the only foolproof way is to show up at meetings.

Yes. It's prohibited. You'd need rules in your bylaws to allow for electronic "attendance"

No, that's nonsense. When you abstain, voting is what you're abstaining from. You have no effect on the outcome, one way or the other.

There's no rule against it in RONR. But of course if it makes members uncomfortable they can easily avoid the problem by electing only one (or neither) of them.

The retiring officer need not have bothered to clearly state anything, since he was not elected. None of the candidates received a majority, so you need to hold a second and possibly subsequent ballots until someone is elected. If the person elected declines, you keep on voting.

If the chair may vote only in the event of a tie (which is not the rule in RONR, by the way), yet chooses to abstain instead, that's fine. However, a tie vote simply defeats the motion then and there. It does not hang around in limbo waiting for "verbiage" to emerge. So the chair, either by voting No or by abstaining, has effectively decided to defeat the motion. And no, you can't censure someone for exercising a basic right. At least not if you expect to be taken seriously.

No. The minutes should reflect only what was actually done at that meeting prior to adjournment. Written communication to the members is fine, but it does not replace the requirement that the tellers report must be read, and repeated by the chair, and the result announced by the chair at a properly called meeting. I concur with Mr. H.

A quaint notion, but No does cover it.

That's true, but there is no rule in RONR prohibiting non-members from attending a meeting. It says that they have no right to attend, but the decision of who may and who may not attend is left up to the assembly. There is a rule preventing them from speaking in debate, and that rule could not be superseded by a standing rule, but it could be suspended by a 2/3 vote, and it could be superseded by a special rule of order.

I was about to feel his forehead.

There is no advance notice requirement in RONR for getting anything on the agenda. But then again, there is no requirement in RONR for even having an agenda in the first place--especially for regularly scheduled meetings with a frequency of at least quarterly, where the Standard Order of Business in RONR is almost always sufficient. You may have special rules on this in your organization, of which we would have no knowledge

Ultimately, the way this (and similar matters of bylaws interpretation) are decided is that someone who believes (or maintains, arguendo) that the person is not rightly a member raises a Point of Order that the membership should not be considered as valid. The chair rules on the matter, subject to Appeal, in which case the matter is settled by a vote of the assembly. The chair may also place the matter directly before the assembly for a decision.

In other news, water is wet.

Er, ironically enough, that's "once in a while"

It seems unlikely to me that the requirements in the bylaws for holding office would be written so as to allow anyone in the state except that one individual to be eligible.

Well, explicit or not, the 2/3 vote is necessary because by the rules in RONR, non-members may not speak in debate. Allowing them to speak is a motion to Suspend the Rules that interfere with their participation. The rule that non-members may not vote may not be suspended--not even with a unanimous vote. That's probably in line with the 1915 version, though not in so many words.

Well, it does raise a possible issue. In order to comply with the rules on RONR, an "electronic" system would have to allow for write-in votes, unless there's something to the contrary in the bylaws.