Improper Election?

[Guest wparker]

Our bylaws state that nominations will be held at first one meeting, then again at the next meeting, and then a vote for officers will be held at a third meeting. Traditionally we also allow for third nominations on the night of the election. This year, a losing candidate complained about this (3 meetings later though) and is seeking to have the election declared illegal. Since he was the only candidate nominated to a office in the first two nominations he wants himself declared elected to the office.

Can he be simply declared elected?

Or must we re-hold the election?

Or does the election stand because no one complained on the night of the election?

Thank you

[hmtcastle]

Can he be simply declared elected?

Or must we re-hold the election?

Or does the election stand because no one complained on the night of the election?

No (it might have been possible but it's too late now).

No (but see below).

Yes (but see below).

I assume someone else was properly elected in spite of the fact that there was only one nominee (who wasn't elected). If no one was elected then you must complete the election (i.e. vote again).

[Gary Novosielski]

Our bylaws state that nominations will be held at first one meeting, then again at the next meeting, and then a vote for officers will be held at a third meeting. Traditionally we also allow for third nominations on the night of the election. This year, a losing candidate complained about this (3 meetings later though) and is seeking to have the election declared illegal. Since he was the only candidate nominated to a office in the first two nominations he wants himself declared elected to the office.

Can he be simply declared elected?

Or must we re-hold the election?

Or does the election stand because no one complained on the night of the election?

"There's a lot of truth in what actually happens."

...but I'm not sure I can tell what actually happened, yet. This "losing" candidate, I presume, "lost" to someone else in the election. And I presume this followed the nomination of another candidate on the night of the election, who went on to receive a majority vote. (If I'm wrong, and nobody was elected, then you just need to finish (not re-hold) the election by voting on that office again.)

But if what I'm presuming actually happend, then:

• No, he cannot simply be declared elected.
• No, you do not re-hold the election.
• Yes, the election stands.

First, complaining, whining, and grousing are not parliamentary processes recognized by RONR. And there was a limited time during which he could even have raised a Point of Order. That interval is long past.

Basically there were no serious flaws in your process. We can't interpret bylaws here but clearly, according to your custom, your bylaws have long been held by your membership to require nominations on the two prior meeting nights, and to permit nominations on the third, or election, night. It might be possible to argue otherwise, but it would take a careful parsing of each word of your bylaws to come to any conclusion, and it still might be one on which reasonable people could disagree. Since the final decision would be up to your membership anyway, there's no sense looking for a bylaws breach here. If a point of order had been raised, the discussion could have taken place, but it didn't.

Or, even conceding the point on the bylaws objection, he could have raised a point of order that nominations had been reopened without a valid motion to do so. (If that is what happened.) If your presiding officer, assuming unanimous consent, simply called for nominations from the floor on election night by saying, "If there are no objections, nominations from the floor are now reopened" then any member could have objected at that time. If the chair, simply following custom, asked "Are there any last-minute nominations for the office of Lesser Poobah?" any member could have raised a point of order that a motion to reopen nominations was not made. Even if objected to at the time, these are nit-picking points, and either of them could have been cured immediately by simply putting the question right then and there about reopening nominations. It only takes a majority vote, after all, but at this point it doesn't matter.

Since no timely points of order were raised with respect to any of the preparations for the election then, once the election began, the door was closed on whatever came before it.

In the grand scheme of things, the right of the membership to vote for and select their own leaders would trump the (imagined) right of a sore loser to hold office because of an inconsequential hiccup in the nomination process.

[Josh Martin]

Can he be simply declared elected?

No.

Or must we re-hold the election?

No.

Or does the election stand because no one complained on the night of the election?

Yes, and he might not have had much success complaining on the night of the election either. He could have objected to the chair reopening nominations, but that would just mean the chair would have to put it to a vote, since unanimous consent was not achieved. Majority rules. Once voting began, it was far too late to complain about the nominating process.