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Election of Chair


Guest Evelyn

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1. If the Bylaws says that "a simple majority vote of the entire seated Board is necessary for election" and their are three people in the race and the entire seated Board votes and the vote is 5 to 4 to 2. Does the person with 5 votes win?

2. Once an election has taken place and the gavel has been passed and the meeting has been adjourned, can the election be challenged at a later time. The bylaws are silent.

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1) Nope. No matter how you interpret your ambiguous statement of the vote threshold (see p. 402 for the "right" way), 5 votes isn't a majority (simple or intelligent) of anything.

2) Nope. The chair's (presumed, although you didn't say it happened) statement of who won should have been questioned with a point of order at the time. But now it is too late (p. 250, 251). The announced result stands.

A possible exception to what I just said: if the ballots have been saved securely, someone could move for a recount which could change the result -- it gives the chair, when the results are (re-)announced a chance to correct his error. Recount requires a majority however, so if a majority likes the way things turned out, they will vote down the motion to recount and that is the end of it.

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1) A possible exception to what I just said: if the ballots have been saved securely, someone could move for a recount which could change the result -- it gives the chair, when the results are (re-)announced a chance to correct his error. Recount requires a majority however, so if a majority likes the way things turned out, they will vote down the motion to recount and that is the end of it.

... I agree with "a possible." John, isn't it the case that if the issue is the chair's interpretation of the results (not his knowledge of what the numbers are), it's a procedural question, and therefore, as you in your second point, too late now?

2.

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... I agree with "a possible." John, isn't it the case that if the issue is the chair's interpretation of the results (not his knowledge of what the numbers are), it's a procedural question, and therefore, as you in your second point, too late now?

2.

Perhaps the suggestion was that, if physical ballots have been saved securely, the assembly could plausibly go through the motions of ordering a recount, thereby giving the chair a second chance to announce the results (and to do it right this time).

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I am interpreting (the book doesn't say) an adopted motion for a recount to have a similar effect as an adopted motion to reconsider: matters are "reset" to a point just before the vote is counted. So after the recount the president is free to state the result correctly, this time.

The analogy isn't perfect since an adopted Reconsider allows for more debate and an actual revote on a question. But it seems reasonable as a partial analogy.

The book (2020-?, or an "Official Interpretation) needs to expand a bit on the consequences of adopting "Recount". Not to mention supplying a set of SDCs.

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Perhaps the suggestion was that, if physical ballots have been saved securely, the assembly could plausibly go through the motions of ordering a recount, thereby giving the chair a second chance to announce the results (and to do it right this time).

Precisely. The ostensible reason for ordering a recount is that the first count was inaccurate, not that a rule of order was broken.

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