Revising a Constitution

[jordyberne]

I'm the secretary for my organization, and I want to revise our constitution. We don't have a bylaws section, but we do have 6 or 7 amendments listed out at the end of the constitution.

Our constitution hasn't really been updated in over 10 years, so a lot of it's contents are out of date. There's a lot of things I need to change to make the constitution reflect how my organization currently functions, so it seems like it would make more sense to write an updated constitution and have it ratified at a meeting instead of voting on multiple, specific amendments.

The amendments sections of our constitution says that "This constitution shall be ratified by 2/3 vote of the active membership present and voting."

My questions are:

1: Am I allowed to just change whatever I want and then pass my updated constitution with a 2/3 vote?

2: Most (or all) of the amendments are irrelevant at this point. If I make a revised constitution, can I not include the old amendments at the end of the document?

[Chris Harrison]

See RONR pp. 592-599 regarding amending the Bylaws (Constitution) with a focus on p. 593 ll.16-31 which discusses revisions.

[George Mervosh]

I'm the secretary for my organization, and I want to revise our constitution. We don't have a bylaws section, but we do have 6 or 7 amendments listed out at the end of the constitution.

Our constitution hasn't really been updated in over 10 years, so a lot of it's contents are out of date. There's a lot of things I need to change to make the constitution reflect how my organization currently functions, so it seems like it would make more sense to write an updated constitution and have it ratified at a meeting instead of voting on multiple, specific amendments.

The amendments sections of our constitution says that "This constitution shall be ratified by 2/3 vote of the active membership present and voting."

My questions are:

1: Am I allowed to just change whatever I want and then pass my updated constitution with a 2/3 vote?

2: Most (or all) of the amendments are irrelevant at this point. If I make a revised constitution, can I not include the old amendments at the end of the document?

I'm not trying to be rude but you need to rid yourself of the "I need" "I want" "I make" stuff. Proposed amendments and a proposed revision might be able to be proposed by one member, but the group may feel a committee is well suited to the task as well.

[jordyberne]

Thanks! The page numbers were a huge help!

As far as my language, it wasn't intended to convey solely my intentions. Actually, I am working with a committee. I was just trying to formulate my questions and since I was posting on the committee's behalf I used the word "I."