e-mail voting

[Guest John]

One of our board members sent the following to me but the last time I checked, RONR had not yet approved voting by e-mail. What's the latest? Here is what I received from the board member: John I found an article called “Robert’s Rules of Order for e-mail meetings” by Daniel Berleant and Byron Liu and they state “a vote by e-mail shall be acceptable unless explicitly disallowed”. 

 

[George Mervosh]

One of our board members sent the following to me but the last time I checked, RONR had not yet approved voting by e-mail. What's the latest? Here is what I received from the board member: John I found an article called “Robert’s Rules of Order for e-mail meetings” by Daniel Berleant and Byron Liu and they state “a vote by e-mail shall be acceptable unless explicitly disallowed”. 

 

Uh, no.  The latest is the same as it ever was.

 

"It is a fundamental principle of parliamentary law that the right to vote is limited to the members of an organization who are actually present at the time the vote is taken in a regular or properly called meeting, although it should be noted that a member need not be present when the question is put. Exceptions to this rule must be expressly stated in the bylaws. Such possible exceptions include: (a) voting by postal mail, e-mail, or fax, and ( b ) proxy voting."  RONR (11th ed.), p. 423

[jstackpo]

Guest_John

 

Could you ask your friend to give you the citation for the article, please.

 

And pass it on to me  --  you can use the internal mail system on this board if you join up as a member - it's painless.

 

Never mind  --  I found it via Google.  Here  Dated 1995  --  18 years old.  It that it?

 

But, tell your friend to re-read the document again, more carefully:  the "explicitly disallowed" busines is in a collection of proposals for changes to RONR, not an existing rule in RONR. 

 

Thanks

[Steven Britton]

One of our board members sent the following to me but the last time I checked, RONR had not yet approved voting by e-mail. What's the latest? Here is what I received from the board member: John I found an article called “Robert’s Rules of Order for e-mail meetings” by Daniel Berleant and Byron Liu and they state “a vote by e-mail shall be acceptable unless explicitly disallowed”. 

 

The article was written in 1995 and cites the nineth edition. It's two editions behind.

[Josh Martin]

One of our board members sent the following to me but the last time I checked, RONR had not yet approved voting by e-mail. What's the latest? Here is what I received from the board member: John I found an article called “Robert’s Rules of Order for e-mail meetings” by Daniel Berleant and Byron Liu and they state “a vote by e-mail shall be acceptable unless explicitly disallowed”. 

 

The board member is incorrect. It's quite the opposite - e-mail voting is not permitted by RONR unless explicitly allowed in an organization's bylaws.

 

Based on the article, it appears that the authors were citing the 9th edition (1990). I don't believe that text addressed e-mail voting at all, since it was not as widespread a technology at that time. To the best of my knowledge, e-mail voting was not addressed until the 10th edition (2000).

 

Additionally, as others have noted, it appears that the articles were making suggestions as to what should be included in the 10th edition (and/or proposing rules for societies to adopt on their own to supplement RONR), not making a claim about what RONR currently permitted. The RONR Authorship Team has a different view on the subject, which is articulated in RONR, 11th ed., pg. 98, lines 11-19.