Joshua Katz

PL is Parliamentary Law. It is a book by General Robert about parliamentary procedure, and explains a great deal, but is not "rules" in the sense of RONR when your organization has adopted Robert's Rules. How do you have multiple chairs? Per RONR, the chair may speak against a motion by giving up the gavel for the length of the topic, but your rules may be stricter. I still don't know, other than speaking at the meeting, what he is doing to undermine the motion. Can you be more specific? He is free, especially outside a meeting, to say he doesn't like it. He is allowed to politic in order to gather the votes to rescind or amend. He can't interfere with carrying it out, and can be subject to discipline if he does that. So the specific ways he is undermining it determine the answer.

But if I didn't abbreviate, it would really sound like a rule!

Well, it's not exactly a rule, but there is this from PL: “The greatest lesson for democracies to learn is for the majority to give to the minority a full, free opportunity to present their side of the case, and then for the minority, having failed to win a majority to their views, gracefully to submit and to recognize the action as that of the entire organization, and cheerfully to assist in carrying it out until they can secure its repeal.” A member should not act to disrupt a majority decision; I'm not sure you need a rule for that, because it's the basic assumption of a deliberative assembly. Namely, part of being a deliberative assembly is that everyone assumes they will remain members even when they are unhappy with a decision. But a decision is not a decision forever, and certainly a member may undermine a majority decision in one way: by moving to rescind or amend, as the quote from PL says. What sort of undermining do you have in mind?

Your organization will have to decide, given your customized rules, to what extent, if any, the unaddressed (and uncontradicted) rules in RONR apply. It sounds to me like the "hearing by the Board" should be held in executive session, but I don't see any need to hold the decision to prefer charges in executive session. Thinking practically, while RONR counsels that we don't want the details of the trial to get out (but that, to be fair, is in the context where the whole organization has the right to participate), but certainly the results will be obvious, and hence it will be obvious that charges were preferred (well, maybe not entirely obvious, but closer). That's my view, anyway. Arguably, there's no need to hold the hearing in executive session either, since your rules have modified the RONR procedure (hence, are not silent) and yet do not require, so far as we know anyway, that the hearing be in executive session. There is also a practical reason to think it needn't be: members, arguably, have a right to know about such an important decision, and its basis. When the procedures in RONR are used, they have that right. When the board, instead, makes the decision, and does it in executive session, the members don't know what happened. But certainly it is not wrong to hold it in executive session.

If what was done so far was incorrect, it does not appear to me that any remedy is possible, except discipline or censure for those who did it. But nothing of what we've seen so far suggests to me that there has been a trial. You apparently have customized rules for the conduct of discipline, since RONR says nothing about fees and the like. According to RONR, a trial should be held by the full assembly, not the board, in executive session. But what do your customized rules say happen at this point?

Then the meaning seems clear, and a lower-ranking rule in conflict would be null and void, unless something else in the Constitution provides for suspension of this rule. (As an aside, there is some ambiguity in the rule, although it doesn't seem to impact your question: it first requires 12 month availability, and then sets the bar, seemingly, at 10 months, although there might be some difference between availability and physical presence.)

Any lower-ranking rule contradicting a higher-ranking rule is null and void. My question is: policies and procedures section of what? If it is a section of the Constitution, your Constitution will contain a contradiction, and you'd need to resolve that (more specific provision governs) or, better yet, fix it while you're amending. If, on the other hand, the policies and procedures refers to standing rules (more common), then, assuming the rule in the Constitution is as you paraphrase, that rule will govern, no matter what the lower-ranked rules say, and such a person will be ineligible to run. However, a full answer would require knowing more about the Constitution (does the rule allow for its own suspension, etc.) which would take us into interpretation, which only your organization can perform. Another interpretation question is presented, which is also left for your organization: does the restriction also apply to holding office? If the restriction is truly only on running, such a person could win as a write-in, or be appointed to a vacancy, etc. Of course, if your organization is unhappy with the rule in the Constitution, it is, subject to the procedures for doing so, free to amend the Constitution to something it will be happier with. (There may be some legal restrictions on changes to the Constitution if it must be filed as part of your incorporation documents, but that is a legal question beyond the scope of this forum.) If you see this before it happens, by the way, don't be surprised if this post is moved later to the basic forum.

Fair enough. I don't think adopting a special rule endorsing a method you don't like, which also is not what RONR calls for, is a good baby step, though. A better baby step, in my opinion, is ignoring this particular issue for now. (Of course, if the method were called for in RONR, then adopting a special rule of order would also be a bad idea.)

It depends on your bylaws. Nothing in RONR prohibits it. That said, if a person holds two board positions (I'm guessing at least one is something other than director), that person still gets only one vote. As a late poster put it, you could heads, not hats. However, check your bylaws and see if they prevent one person from holding more than one position.

And George H.W. Bush was Vice-President when he ran for President.

I might say the opposite, though. In a large assembly, I think we should do what we can to implement RONR's guidance on floor assignment (which, after all, is where we learned it - the Congress and the Parliament). Sure, there are challenges - it's not easy to see who stood up first when we have a thousand people, but we do the best we can. I think the colored cards system is useful, as is having multiple microphones. But now go to a 20 person meeting. Do the rules still make sense? We're not going to stand for recognition, we're going to raise hands, and does it really make sense to determine the next speaker by whose hand goes up first? Okay, yes, I can make an argument - it keeps discussion better focused, because it means the next speaker is more likely to be responding to the previous speaker, whereas with a list, it's just someone who wanted to speak from the beginning. But people who aren't directly responding can shoot their hands up, too - and, in my experience, even if a person wanted to speak from the start, he will adapt his comments to what has gone before, and if his point has been made already, he'll often (but by no means always) just take a pass. So I'm unclear, in a small body, what is wrong with the system OP describes? But, then again, OP isn't seeking to change it (and seemingly doesn't see anything wrong with it, either). All he's seeking to do is make it a rule. That's where I think the "trap" idea makes more sense - if adopting a rule won't change anything, except to lock in a system you think is inferior to the default alternative, why adopt one?

I would suggest, given your context, ordering one of those writing on glass placards, and having it engraved with "The rules of order are to protect rights and facilitate business." Or at least write a notecard. When you know how it should be done, it is easy to try to correct everything at once. If you want another metaphor, I was the weightlifting coach when I taught high school. (Those who know me will be surprised by this, but it was a very different stage of life.) Most of the time, students did not have well-defined goals, but some actually wanted to learn weightlifting - that is, the clean and jerk and the snatch. These are complex, difficult lifts, and when a student is trying them, there's an understandable instinct to work on the double knee bend, the hip movement, the elbow speed, the wrist movement, the jump, the landing, etc. etc. But if I lecture a student for 10 minutes above everything wrong with the snatch they just attempted, the next attempt will be no better. If, instead, I work on the hip hinge, the next effort might have a decent hip hinge. (Of course, that's because I already taught them the hip hinge, by working with KBs and medicine balls for a few weeks before their first attempt at a clean.)

Why not just shrug and figure it's been accepted by unanimous consent? Put it this way: if you walk into a room and everyone is grabbing live chickens and stuffing them into their mouths, and you are supposed to teach them table manners, don't start with the spoon that sits parallel to the table edge on the far side of the plate being for dessert. But also don't change table manners so that eating live chickens is fine. Just start with something that's dysfunctional. I'm not convinced this way of doing things is dysfunctional, but in any event, keep in mind that a meeting is not a lesson in parliamentary procedure, and RONR should not be used as a pointless formality. If you think rights are being trampled, say that. But it seems you don't, since you want a rule to this effect. To what end? Just so you can say you're in compliance? I'd suggest finding something that isn't working, and showing how RONR can make that better, first.

It works well for a group that size. I agree with the others that it would not work well for a larger group. In response to Mr. Transpower, in a group of 17, it is fairly predictable on which side members will speak, and the officer Mr. Brown is referencing lists them in alternating order when possible. I like this approach in a small group, even if it is not technically RONR compliant. It achieves everything RONR wants to achieve, without there being a race to be recognized after every speaker. In turn, that lets members actually pay attention to the speaker, instead of fixating on how to get recognized next. Where it fails is when there are multiple amendments. I've been called upon, for instance, to speak on an amendment, because I was listed for the main motion, but had nothing to say about the amendment. This produced at least once a negative outcome: a motion was made, and immediately an amendment was moved. Even though I was listed before the amendment was made, when the chair got to me, I declined, since I had no opinion on the amendment. Time then expired, and the assembly declined motions to extend time, even though no one had spoken in the negative. I believe that part of the reluctance to extend time on my motion arose from my having turned down the floor, despite the fact that I hadn't sought it for the amendment. So I think it is necessary to maintain separate lists once an amendment is made, and know where you are on the main list in order to return to it without calling on people for the amendment who haven't sought to speak on it. When I chaired a committee that frequently met online, I did it that way, and it worked well.

Is the Phylacter a member of the body that adopted the motion in the first place? In any event, what happened next?

Well, it's irrelevant that the presidency will change; the question is what your bylaws say about filling vacancies. If they say nothing, vacancies are filled by the body which initially elected the position. So what, if anything, do your bylaws say about vacancies, and who elected the secretary to begin with?

Yes, but I share the intuition that a game shouldn't end in a tie, or at least that it's not desirable, but have no such intuition about the vote on a motion (as opposed to an election). I think the difference for me goes back to the presence of a status quo. There are artificial solutions in sports because we can't just say "in the event of a tie, the status quo stands" when it's a fight between equal outcomes, so to speak. In the case of a motion, not adopting it is privileged. Of course, we could break sports ties in simpler ways - home team wins, for instance - so the means of tie-breaking don't seem entirely arbitrary, since we're more likely to think sudden-death overtime is fair than "home team wins" or "high seed wins."

Why is it artificial, though? There's a status quo, and a motion is an effort to change it, which requires a majority. I understand why it grates on the nerves if the decision comes from an entirely artificial rule (i.e. my entire middle school math career, which only made sense when I got to grad school), but I don't understand why this rule seems artificial.

I'm not aware of anything in RONR about it, but I'm also not aware of it as an adopted custom across organizations. Some organizations might see some point to it. Personally, I don't - ties aren't bad, they just mean the motion fails, and I'm not sure that an odd number of members makes ties any less likely (absences, vacancies, abstentions, etc.).

All it requires is climbing the belltower during a lightening strike.

Small steps are in order, and you might consider trying to hold a class on RONR, etc. outside the meeting context. During a meeting, you're trying to accomplish business, and it's not the best environment for learning new ways of doing things. As the General put it, meetings are not classes in parliamentary procedure. When there's nothing to accomplish, people might be more open to learning new things. You might also point out that, even if everyone gets along, at some point in the future a new board might not get along, and an established habit of doing things in an orderly fashion will be helpful. Or, my go to: using effective procedure gets me home for dinner earlier. It's good to hear, though, that your organization will not be laying off 15k people and closing factories.

Fair enough. I took it to mean discussion. I guess we'll both have to wait and find out.

No. Executive Session is something that happens during a meeting (if the assembly chooses to enter one).

It defines an agenda as a series of special orders and/or general orders, i.e. business items. It does not define an agenda as a list of "discussion items."

So far as RONR is concerned, your agenda is a proposed agenda until approved at the meeting. The Secretary cannot make an agenda, only the body can adopt one. (An agenda is also not a list of items for discussion, but that's another story.) So just remove it before you approve the agenda. If other rules apply, such as applicable procedural laws, that might complicate things, but in general, not doing something on your "agenda" is easier than doing something not on it.