Jump to content
The Official RONR Q & A Forums

Out of Order Motions


Mike Phillips

Recommended Posts

23 minutes ago, Mike Phillips said:

A motion to accept the proposed agenda was passed at the beginning of a meeting. A person joined the electronic meeting late and wanted to modify the agenda. The chair ruled the motion out of order. Does a motion ruled out of order by the chair have to be recorded in the minutes?

Yes, the motion must be recorded in the minutes. A motion to amend the agenda (after it is adopted) is a form of the motion  to Amend Something Previously Adopted, which is an incidental main motion. All main motions (except those which were withdrawn) are included in the minutes. This includes motions which are ruled out of order. The chair’s ruling (and his reasoning) should also be included in the minutes.

I am also unclear on what basis the motion was ruled out of order. I see nothing from the facts presented which would suggest the motion was not in order. (This doesn’t change my answer regarding the minutes, but if the chair’s ruling was incorrect, this would be good to know for the future.)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

16 hours ago, Josh Martin said:

Amend Something Previously Adopted

So I'm confused. The Motion to Amend Something Previously Adopted is §35. According to RONR In Brief, this motion is used in a meeting after the meeting being discussed in this example. Therefore, it seems that §37, the Motion to Reconsider, is the correct motion. It can be made only by a member who voted with the prevailing side. This meeting was not a standing or special committee, so an absent person (in this example, a person who came into the meeting late) did not vote with the prevailing side and does not have a right to move to reconsider. The original motion to approve the agenda passed unanimously. Therefore, the motion (to Reconsider) was deemed out of order. What am I missing? Recall that after the agenda was passed, a member came in late and wanted to modify an agenda item. Since the member was not present for the vote, her motion (which should have been made as a Motion to Reconsider) was deemed out of order. The fact that the motion was not in proper form was not part of the basis for deeming the motion out of order.

Edited by Mike Phillips
Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, Mike Phillips said:

The Motion to Amend Something Previously Adopted is §35. According to RONR In Brief, this motion is used in a meeting after the meeting being discussed in this example.

Although it is easy to get that impression from RONR In Brief, in reality there are no time limits to use this motion. Specifically, it can be used even if it is at the same meeting where the motion was originally adopted.

"Although reconsideration is the preferable procedure . . . when possible, an adopted main motion, at any time before or after it is too late to reconsider it, can be changed by means of the motion to Amend Something Previously Adopted" (RONR 11th ed., p. 112, lines 2-6)

One reason reconsideration would be preferable is that reconsideration only requires a majority vote. Because there is no opportunity to give notice for the motion to Amend Something Previously Adopted, it would require a two-thirds vote or majority of the entire membership.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Under standard characteristic #2 for Amend Something Previously Adopted (ASPA), RONR says: "can be applied to anything... which has continuing force and effect and which was made or created at any time or times as the result of the adoption of one or more main motions." (my emphasis). Even though ASPA may be used primarily to amend or rescind an action taken at some previous meeting, this  statement indicates that there is no prohibition against using ASPA on actions taken previously within the same meeting.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, Mike Phillips said:

So I'm confused. The Motion to Amend Something Previously Adopted is §35. According to RONR In Brief, this motion is used in a meeting after the meeting being discussed in this example. Therefore, it seems that §37, the Motion to Reconsider, is the correct motion. It can be made only by a member who voted with the prevailing side.

An affirmative vote to adopt an agenda may not be reconsidered. RONR explicitly states this. I imagine this is a particular application of the general rule that a motion to Reconsider may not be applied to a motion when it has been partly carried out.

RONR does not specifically state that a motion to amend an adopted agenda is a motion to Amend Something Previously Adopted, but the description seems quite similar. In any event, RONR is clear that such a motion is in order and describes the vote required.

"CHANGING AN AGENDA. When the adoption of a proposed agenda is pending, it is subject to amendment by majority vote. After an agenda has been adopted by the assembly, no change can be made in it except by a two-thirds vote, a vote of a majority of the entire membership, or unanimous consent. (See also Taking Up Business Out of Its Proper Order, pp. 363–64; cf. p. 630, ll. 12–17.) An affirmative vote to adopt an agenda may not be reconsidered." (RONR, 11th ed., pg. 373)

I also concur with my colleagues that no rule in RONR prevents making a motion to Amend Something Previously Adopted in connection with a motion adopted at the same meeting. Reconsider is certainly preferable if it is an option, but there are situations in which Reconsider will not be in order even although it is the same meeting, but Rescind or Amend Something Previously Adopted will be in order. This is one of those situations.

Edited by Josh Martin
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Based on the input here, it seems that the motion may have been improperly ruled out of order. If that's the case, what's the proper course of action for the chair? The motion was made by a recalcitrant member who wanted to interfere with the conducting of business, but procedure is procedure. The agenda was published with requisite notice before the meeting. The motion in the agenda passed unanimously. The matter at issue is election of an officer. The recalcitrant member wanted to table the election of the officer for a week to invite new candidates to apply. The member already had notice that the election would be held and had ample opportunity to participate and to nominate someone for the position. 

Thanks for the discussion. It's very helpful. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Mike Phillips said:

If that's the case, what's the proper course of action for the chair?

There is no action to take at this point, other than to avoid making the same mistake in the future. Generally, a Point of Order regarding an issue must be raised at the time of the breach. It is too late to correct the error now.

1 hour ago, Mike Phillips said:

The agenda was published with requisite notice before the meeting.

This means nothing so far as RONR is concerned. RONR does not require the use of an agenda at all and notes that most assemblies would do just fine with the standard order of business. Even if an assembly is to use an agenda, there is no requirement that the draft agenda must be published or that notice be given of the draft agenda, and doing these things does not interfere with the assembly's ability to amend the agenda (either before or after its adoption).

If your organization has its own rules on this subject, that could affect matters.

1 hour ago, Mike Phillips said:

The recalcitrant member wanted to table the election of the officer for a week to invite new candidates to apply.

I would note that the member still could have made these motions even without them being listed on the agenda, for multiple reasons.

  • There is no rule in RONR that a motion must be listed on the agenda in order to be considered.
  • Even if the organization has its own rules requiring motions to be listed on the agenda in order to be considered, such rules generally do not apply to subsidiary or incidental motions such as a motion to postpone (not table) a pending election or a motion to reopen nominations for the election, either of which is in order. Indeed, it would be rather unusual to list such motions on the agenda.
Edited by Josh Martin
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thanks, Josh! The purpose of mentioning notice is to make it clear that the member had ample time to accomplish the objective. No one was trying to steamroll anything, although that's the insinuation being made.

Final question on this topic. The recalcitrant member has asked that the minutes be updated to reflect that the motion was improperly deemed out of order. The minutes have not yet been approved. Does the member make a motion to amend the minutes after which the body votes up or down? It's pretty hard to add to the minutes, "The chair/parliamentarian screwed up."

Link to comment
Share on other sites

31 minutes ago, Mike Phillips said:

Final question on this topic. The recalcitrant member has asked that the minutes be updated to reflect that the motion was improperly deemed out of order. The minutes have not yet been approved. Does the member make a motion to amend the minutes after which the body votes up or down? It's pretty hard to add to the minutes, "The chair/parliamentarian screwed up."

Yes, when the minutes are pending for approval, the member would make the motion to add this correction to the minutes.

I would not advise adding this as the minutes are intended to be a record of what happened, and not include commentary on what happened. So the minutes would reflect the motion, the chair's ruling that the motion was out of order, and the chair's reasoning for his ruling, but that's it. To the extent that the assembly does agree to the member's request, I would advise including it as a footnote rather than in the body of the minutes. A wording to the effect of "It was later determined that this ruling was mistaken, and that a motion to amend the agenda after adoption is in order." seems appropriate to me.

10 minutes ago, Bruce Lages said:

Amending the agenda seems like an unnecessary, and probably out of order, procedure for postponing an election when the subsidiary motion to postpone to a certain time would have been in order when the election became the pending item of business.

I agree that it is unnecessary, but I don't know that it is out of order. While it is unusual to include subsidiary motions in an agenda, I don't know that it is actually prohibited to do so. I can conceive of theoretical cases where this might even be desirable, such as if numerous amendments to a motion are anticipated.

Edited by Josh Martin
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
×
×
  • Create New...