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Question on if motion includes 2/3rds vote requirement is propert


Guest E. Ellis

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I work in an organaization with approxmately two hundred members. There is a desire to take a proposal to our administrators to go to twelve hour days from that of eight hour days.  This has been a very controversial subject.

 

Our organization is structured to follow RONR through our by-lays.  We are preparing to have a vote to gauge the desire of this change in hours.

 

If a person made a motion requiring the results of the vote must meet the 2/3rds threshold before any such proposal could be recommended to our administration, would that be a valid motion? Or would it have to be based on a majority?

 

I have reviewed RONR and the closest I have came up with are the concpets that if a vote takes away rights of a member, then votes such as that require 2/3rds, or if specific votes call for a 2/3rds requirement in our by-laws.

 

Thank you very much.

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...If a person made a motion requiring the results of the vote must meet the 2/3rds threshold before any such proposal could be recommended to our administration, would that be a valid motion? ...

Yes. But some of the details, not all of which I follow and more of which might be required for a knowledgeable answer, might affect this. Either way, to change the normal vote threshold will itself require a 2/3 vote, maybe more.

(I put in all those qualifiers because I'm not at my best, and I suspect there might be a good reason nobody else ventured a reply to this question in over 12 hours.)

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If a person made a motion requiring the results of the vote must meet the 2/3rds threshold before any such proposal could be recommended to our administration, would that be a valid motion?

 

Yes but . . . it would only take a majority vote to amend the motion to remove the two-thirds threshold.

 

Edited to add: It would be trickier to require a two-thirds vote to adopt the motion but that seems to be a different question. In this instance it will still take just a majority vote to adopt the motion but no action will be taken unless it received a two-thirds vote.

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Yes but . . . it would only take a majority vote to amend the motion to remove the two-thirds threshold.

But only while it was pending, yea?

Edited to add: It would be trickier to require a two-thirds vote to adopt the motion but that seems to be a different question. In this instance it will still take just a majority vote to adopt the motion but no action will be taken unless it received a two-thirds vote.

You confident of this? It looks awfully zany to me. A majority vote to do something that affects a rule of order. Really? But I uncomfortably recognize that this question resembles one that Shmuel Gerber and Dan Seabold vigorously spanked me about at Hofstra about ten years ago, after, here on the website, we had interminably been hashing about or thrashing about it for maybe weeks.

But what I think, or remember, or both, is that the issue is that hitting a rule of order takes a 2/3 vote, and hitting an administrative rule takes just a majority vote, and what's tricky is that sometimes something looks a rule of order, and, ordinariy, would be one, but, in effect, as far as considering it is concerned, is effectively administrative.

(But of course, changing an administrative rule, not a rule of order, of course requires a 2/3 vote or one of the variations. So I'm lost for now.)

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But only while it was pending, yea?

Yes, while it is pending.

 

You confident of this? It looks awfully zany to me. A majority vote to do something that affects a rule of order. Really?

Confident? Reasonably. Zany? Yes.

 

I, too, recall an earlier discussion.

 

But I don't see this as affecting any rules of order. It's just a conditional motion. That is, an action will be taken (sending a recommendation to the administrators) only if a certain condition (a two-thirds vote) is met. That doesn't change the voting requirement (the rule of order) which is still a majority vote.

 

If it's too zany for most members to contemplate, the solution, as noted, is to amend the pending motion to remove the zaniness.

 

Or, I suppose, the chair could rule it out of order on the basis of excess zaniness but I'd probably vote to overturn that ruling. And then vote to remove the zaniness from the motion.

 

Finally, nothing would prevent a majority of the members from, independently, making the same recommendation to the administrators.

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So let me see if I understand what you guys are saying. A motion to set the voting threshold at 2/3 would be in order, but it would require a 2/3 vote to pass. However, when that motion is being considered, a motion to amend could be made to that motion that the threshold be a majority. The amendment could carry with a majority vote. So, now we would be left with a motion to set the threshold at a majority and it would require a 2/3 vote for that motion to pass, but it doesn't matter because the end result will be the same anyway. Is that what you are saying?

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Is that what you are saying?

 

It's not what I'm saying. I'm not playing around with the voting requirement at all. It remains a majority to adopt. I'm just saying that the contemplated action depends not on whether the motion is adopted but by how much the motion is adopted. Assuming, of course, that a majority doesn't strip this "zany" provision from the pending motion.

 

For example: "I move that we recommend X to the administrators if this motion is approved by at least two-thirds of the members present and voting". The vote is 5-4. The motion is adopted but the recommendation is not made.

 

Alternatively, while the same motion is pending, a member moves to strike everything after the word "administrators". The amendment is adopted by a vote of 5-4. The amended motion is then adopted by a vote of 5-4. The recommendation is made.

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I suppose that a motion could be worded that way, but I've never seen it done that way. 

 

I seem to recall a few instances on this forum where, if memory serves, a church was voting to appoint a new pastor but wanted to do so only if the vote was unanimous (presumably to avoid hard feelings?). There's no need to deal with the unfamiliar arcana of "suspending the rules", just include a proviso in the motion that the pastor will only be appointed if the vote is unanimous. Of course it must be stressed, again, that a majority vote is enough to strip the motion of the proviso.

 

Edited to add: And the would-be pastor will probably find out that the vote wasn't unanimous.

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Typically, for a church looking for a pastor, the concern isn't that the preacher will find out, but they feel like if it is the Lord's will that he pastor the church then there will be a greater degree of agreement than a majority. And since they may be voting on more than one person during the process, it actually makes more sense to set the threshold one time rather than adding a proviso to each motion.

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I seem to recall a few instances on this forum where, if memory serves, a church was voting to appoint a new pastor but wanted to do so only if the vote was unanimous (presumably to avoid hard feelings?).

I'm remembering such a case; I think it was Loren Bergeson raised the question (that might ring a bell with the sorely-missed Mr Mountcastle, it was likely around 2004 or maybe 1956, maybe Adlai Stevenson was mentioned, though but not for Pastor); the discussion I remember was with the proposed threshold at 90% (to allow for daffy people, cranks, and the existence of a loyal opposition). Yes, the different vote threshold is independent of adoption: it looks like a rule of order, but as Mr. Edgar Guest says, it isn't: it is simply an aspect of what happens to the motion after it has been adopted, and is no longer a procedural question.

I think.

For now.

Again.

I suppose that a motion could be worded that way, but I've never seen it done that way. When I've seen something like this, the motion to set the threshold was always made separately from the motion it applied to.

Ah. But when the motions are made separately, the motion about the threshold dictates a non-standard vote threshold for adoption of the other, the substantive, motion. So it deals with a rule of order, and changes (suspends) the standard requirement for a pure-and-simple ("vanilla," to ice cream fans, and maybe college graduates while I'm indulging in 4 AM snideness) majority vote for adoption: and, suspending the rules, requires a 2/3 vote, while the other motion, to adopt the pastor, of course still requires only a majority vote. I expect that this is where you're coming from.

Mr Fish, your Post 13 expresses a different perspective from your post 8, doesn't it? If not, I'm confused about what you think about this. Please elucidate. (Or explicate. Or say something using words I'll understand, which I don't.)

(I think Edgar Guest (man. It would really be confusing to say"Mr. Guest" on this website forum here, with Guest_Guest's plastering the walls all over the place; I would welcome Mr Montcastle's stepping back in for a while, or forever), while generally explaining the matter excellently, confuses itintroduces unnecessary complications, when he brings up amending the motion back. Yes, that helps crystallize (or cement, I forget which is which, except when women wear it on a pendant) the difference, but I think one thing at a time, also maybe first things first.

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What I think is that I don't like this idea of applying a threshold proviso directly to the motion. If the motion fails to achieve 2/3, there is still an option for the majority to vote to recommend the action. A better approach would be to use the motion to reconsider, which would accomplish the same thing, but without the confusion.

 

However, it was not my impression that the OP was asking about attaching a proviso to the motion.

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However, it was not my impression that the OP was asking about attaching a proviso to the motion.

 

The question was whether a motion could be structured such that "the results of the vote must meet the 2/3rds threshold before any such proposal could be recommended to our administration". Requiring a two-thirds vote in order to make a recommendation is not that same as requiring a two-thirds vote for adopting the motion.

 

If the motion fails to achieve 2/3, there is still an option for the majority to vote to recommend the action.

 

Better yet, a majority can strip the zany two-thirds proviso while the original motion is pending.

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We are preparing to have a vote to gauge the desire of this change in hours.

 

If a person made a motion requiring the results of the vote must meet the 2/3rds threshold before any such proposal could be recommended to our administration, would that be a valid motion? Or would it have to be based on a majority?

 

The question was whether a motion could be structured such that "the results of the vote must meet the 2/3rds threshold before any such proposal could be recommended to our administration". Requiring a two-thirds vote in order to make a recommendation is not that same as requiring a two-thirds vote for adopting the motion.

 

It appears to me that they are going to vote whether there is a motion to require 2/3 or not. That seems to imply that the two motions are separate. At the very least, I don't think the OP was asking for instructions on the worst possible way to require 2/3.

 

 

Better yet, a majority can strip the zany two-thirds proviso while the original motion is pending.

 

How is that better? They both do about the same thing. And both prove the ineffectiveness of the threshold proviso.

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The question was whether a motion could be structured such that "the results of the vote must meet the 2/3rds threshold before any such proposal could be recommended to our administration". Requiring a two-thirds vote in order to make a recommendation is not that same as requiring a two-thirds vote for adopting the motion.

But unless the action can be carried out, it is a distinction without a difference, and therefore may go beyond zany into the realm of frivolous.

 

What about the rule that the rights of a subset of members of a particular size may not be restricted in the face of opposition exceeding that size?  It seems to me that if the rights of a majority to pass a motion (or to "make a recommendation") are restricted by establishing a higher threshold, it should require the concurrence of at least that number in order to implement that threshold. 

 

What is the point (beyond exercise of the lower oblique zanyoid muscles) of allowing motions to be introduced that even if passed that can't be carried out?

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What about the rule that the rights of a subset of members of a particular size may not be restricted in the face of opposition exceeding that size?

 

I'm unfamiliar with that rule (though I can't see how anyone's rights are being restricted here). And, as noted, a (simple) majority can strip the zaniness from the proposed motion. You might even, as chair, rule such a motion out of order due to excessive zaniness (though, as noted, I would appeal such a ruling).

 

What is the point (beyond exercise of the lower oblique zanyoid muscles) of allowing motions to be introduced that even if passed that can't be carried out?

 

The point is that it might achieve what the assembly wants (overwhelming support) without delving into such parliamentary shenanigans as suspending the rules.

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There was at least one thread on this forum quite some time ago that delved at length into every aspect of inclusion in a motion of a proviso that it should not become effective unless adopted by some specified fraction in excess of a majority, and perhaps someone can provide a reference to it.

 

I, personally, can't work up much enthusiasm for going through it once again. :)

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I work in an organaization with approxmately two hundred members. There is a desire to take a proposal to our administrators to go to twelve hour days from that of eight hour days.  This has been a very controversial subject.

 

Our organization is structured to follow RONR through our by-lays.  We are preparing to have a vote to gauge the desire of this change in hours.

 

If a person made a motion requiring the results of the vote must meet the 2/3rds threshold before any such proposal could be recommended to our administration, would that be a valid motion? Or would it have to be based on a majority?

 

I have reviewed RONR and the closest I have came up with are the concpets that if a vote takes away rights of a member, then votes such as that require 2/3rds, or if specific votes call for a 2/3rds requirement in our by-laws.

 

For starters, yes, this motion would normally require only a majority vote.

 

As has been discussed at length here, however, and at even greater length here, the assembly may Suspend the Rules to actually increase the threshold for adopting the motion to a 2/3 vote. That motion requires a 2/3 vote for adoption. Alternately, the assembly may Amend the motion to provide that it shall only take effect if it is adopted by a 2/3 vote. That will only require a majority vote... but it would be relatively simple to remove that provision, either before or after the motion is adopted.

 

I don't think either of these options is advisable.

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