Parliamentary Procedures

Posted on by hollyfrostgoldportpress

By Holly the Assistant

THWACK!

This meeting of the Huns and Hoydens will come to order. Mr. Vice President, are all present members of the Huns and Hoydens and entitled to participate in our meeting?

Thank you. All present will join me in pledging allegiance to the flag of our country.

Mrs. Secretary, you will call the roll.

Familiar cadence, isn’t it? Some of you are frowning because I didn’t call for the Opening Prayer, or the Motto, or some other bit that, in the group you know best, belongs between the question of if those present are properly voting members or not, and calling the roll. We learned it in 4-H, or in a collecting club, or scouting, or any number of youth organizations. Some of us honed our illegible handwriting by repeatedly getting stuck in the job of secretary as kids.

This is not, i was informed in the early years of our marriage by my husband, a matter learned worldwide. But Americans, Americans may do it badly or wrong, but we have a concept of making a motion and seconding it burned into us pretty early on. We might have to look up if five people vote in favor, four against, and two abstain from voting, if the motion has achieved a majority or not. And most of us have at least a passing familiarity with the existence of Robert’s Rules of Order (and how Gen. Robert came to write it is worth reading https://robertsrules.com/our-history/) and probably in any given organization someone has a copy and can find and look up the question.

We can pretty easily put together a legislative body that can more or less function, and almost draw straws for who has to open the first meeting and run elections to get a chair or president or whatever we wish to call the leader, and get by, in a pinch. And we very nearly do govern our country that way: we make our county commissioners do it, our school board, our library board, our fire board . . . (No, I had not read Alpheus’ guest post when I decided to write this for . . . whatever day it is, in the weirdness that is travel, but it rhymes.)

You know, and I know, and the fifteen-year-old 4-H club president knows, how to run a meeting by parliamentary procedure. It’s not that hard, once you’ve done it. And if you haven’t, go find a local club for whatever you are interested in, and let them teach you how. It’s one of our basic civics skills in the USA.

I will entertain a motion to adjourn.

Thank you, and a second?

Thank you. it has been moved by the dragon and seconded that we adjourn. Is there any discussion? Are you ready for the question? All in favor will raise their right hand or forefoot. All opposed same sign. The motion is carried.

This meeting of the Huns and Hoydens is adjourned.

THWACK!

68 thoughts on “Parliamentary Procedures”

  1. I learned about Robert’s Rules in, of all places, a technical standards group working on computer network technology. RR is normal in such settings but rarely given much attention because normally things are collegial and done by consensus. (Or as a different group phrases it, “rough consensus and working code”.)

    Not this particular outfit. Members walked around with copies of RR. Not just the common short version but the unabridged fat one rarely seen. One obscure thing I learned from seeing it put into use is “motion to reconsider and enter into the minutes”. Look it up, and yes, you’ll need an unabridged version to find it.

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  2. As a contrast: Robert’s Rules of Order are only sorta kinda used in American Freemasonry, but in the end, the Master’s decision rules the day (though the careful and wise Master follows the will of the Brethren, so long as there is no violation of Masonic law or principles). And there is no “motion to adjourn”; the lodge is closed when the Master finds nothing further to come before the lodge.

    We also spend quite a lot of time educating our Masters-to-be not to use the word “please.” The Master of the lodge gives orders; he does not make requests.

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    1. Our current DDGM loves to pose the question: what is the one case where the Master’s decision is *NOT* an order, and why? (The last time he posed the question, I was able to answer both, even before he asked the why part.) If you know, you know. *smirk*

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  3. We, who are the Chaos Riders, can bring spontaneous order as needed to solve problems, then return to the common storm at hand.

    Which is why, when we are unburdened by ass-holery, we are dang near unbeatable in War.

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  4. Unwritten Rule, When The Biggest Dragon says that the meeting is over, then the meeting is over. [Very Big Dragon Grin]

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  5. Fun bonus fact: a motion to adjourn is always in order, according to Robert’s Rules of Order. Beta Club used this my Senior year and ticked off our advisor.

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    1. This is commonly said, but it is not quite true. It is not in order when another has the floor, and it is not in order when a vote is being taken, or between the close of voting and the announcement of the result.

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      1. The current version of Robert’s Rules of Order Newly Revised is the 12th edition, released in 2020. It supersedes all previous editions automatically.

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        1. Which most folks just wanting to read them rather than align with a specific organizational norm won’t care about, or actively do not want, and out of copyright usually has tons of folks offering kindle versions.

          I’m fairly sure the copy we have in our boxes of historical references is a first version for exactly that reason.

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          1. Instead, though (as I recommend further down), folks just wanting to read them would do far better to get a copy of RONR In Brief, both because it’s much more readable and because it’s current.

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            1. “Current” is only useful if those places you are going to interact with it are also current.

              … decades old traditions where folks don’t realize it’s from Robert’s Rules will not be that.

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              1. That’s why you bring the book with you.

                Also, the purpose of all of the rules is to help an assembly make decisions that have the support of the majority while giving the minority – especially a strong minority of more than a third – a chance to be heard and influence others. If an organization has developed its own customs that don’t comport to RONR, and they work, there’s no real reason to get sticky about strict adherence – right up until the point they stop working. Customs of an organization do have some authority, but must always yield to the formal rules. In practice, the average organization breaks the rules all the time, and nothing bad comes of it.

                But it’s never a bad time to educate people on the rules, as long as you do it the right way.

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                1. Nope, when there’s a conflict, SumDood coming in with a brand new book and saying “here we’ll use this” is going to end badly.

                  You’ll be lucky if it’s only bad feelings, “those opposed to him all leave” and “the group is dead” are both on the table.

                  As opposed to “here, this is the original version, it’s probably what ours was based on, we can see the logic here, can we build up something from it to get around this problem?”

                  You’d have more luck with my kids’ laminated cheat sheet bought on sale low these many years ago, on the theory of being exposed to wide range of things adds to growth.

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                  1. This is why I discussed customs, above. In practice, it doesn’t arise, because the kinds of things that change aren’t going to make a material difference in the average organization.

                    But if you’re going to reference a book in 2025, you need to reference the current, authoritative book, not one from 1890 or 1951.

                    I’m not just speaking theoretically here. I’ve been dealing with parliamentary law since I was 16 and active in local ham radio clubs, nearly 50 years ago. Been there, done that.

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                    1. “It says this in the newest edition of this book” has no authority for those who do not already agree with the authority of the current publisher of the book– which, by definition is going to be those who haven’t read it before, as well as those whose organization hasn’t adopted “the current edition of RRoO.”

                      I know you are in gov’t and associated groups. I know that those groups are much more likely to have a rule like “use the current edition.”

                      That’s definitely not going to apply to the topic of the post, which is about the cultural adoption of … well, let me go get the original preface:

                      There appears to be much needed a work on parliamentary law, based, in its general principles, upon the rules and practice of Congress, and adapted, in its details, to the use of ordinary societies. Such a work should give, not only the methods of organizing and conducting the meetings, the duties of the officers and the names of the ordinary motions, but in addition, should state in a systematic manner, in reference to each motion, its object and effect; whether it can be amended or debated; if debatable, the extent to which it opens the main question to debate; the circumstances under which it can be made, and what other motions can be made while it is pending. This Manual has been prepared with a view to supplying the above information in a condensed and systematic manner, each rule being either complete in itself, or giving references to every section that in any way qualifies it, so that a stranger to the work can refer to any special subject with safety.

                      To aid in quickly referring to as many as possible of the rules relating to each motion, there is placed immediately before the Index, a Table of Rules, which enables one, without turning a page, to find the answers to some two hundred questions. The Table of Rules is so arranged as to greatly assist the reader in systematizing his knowledge of parliamentary law.

                      The second part is a simple explanation of the common methods of conducting business in ordinary meetings, in which the motions are classified according to their uses, and those used for a similar purpose compared together. This part is expressly intended for that large class of the community, who are unfamiliar with parliamentary usages and are unwilling to devote much study to the subject, but would be glad with little labor to learn enough to enable them to take part in meetings of deliberative assemblies without fear of being out of order. The object of Rules of Order in deliberative assemblies, is to assist an assembly to accomplish the work for which it was designed, in the best possible manner. To do this, it is necessary to somewhat restrain the individual, as the right of an individual in any community to do what he pleases, is incompatible with the best interests of the whole. Where there is no law, but every man does what is right in his own eyes, there is the least of real liberty. Experience has shown the importance of definiteness in the law; and in this country, where customs are so slightly established and the published manuals of parliamentary practice so conflicting, no society should attempt to conduct business without having adopted some work upon the subject, as the authority in all cases not covered by their own rules.

                      It has been well said by one of the greatest of English writers on parliamentary law: “Whether these forms be in all cases the most rational or not is really not of so great importance. It is much more material that there should be a rule to go by, than what that rule is, that there may be a uniformity of proceeding in business, not subject to the caprice of the chairman, or captiousness of the members. It is very material that order, decency and regularity be preserved in a dignified public body.”

                      H. M. R.

                      https://gutenberg.org/files/9097/9097-h/9097-h.htm

                      Popping in to say “hey, latest edition of a book we never actually adopted says to do this” is directly opposed to the stated purpose.

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                    2. “This Twelfth Edition supersedes all previous editions and is intended automatically to become the parliamentary authority in organizations whose bylaws prescribe “Robert’s Rules of Order”, “Robert’s Rules of Order Revised”, “Robert’s Rules of Order Newly Revised”, or “the current edition of” any of these titles, or the like, without specifying a particular edition. If the bylaws specifically identify one of the eleven previous editions of the work as parliamentary authority, the bylaws should be amended to prescribe “the current edition of Robert’s Rules of Order Newly Revised'” [citation omitted].”

                      From the twelfth edition, written by Henry M. Robert III, the General’s grandson and (before his death in 2019) the head of the Robert’s Rules Association, the organization founded by the General’s daughter-in-law, Sarah Corbin Robert, to carry on his work after his death in 1923, by his designation.

                      The rules weren’t frozen in time in 1951 (publication of the last version of Robert’s Rules of Order Revised),1923, 1915 (publication of the last version written by the General), or 1876 (publication of the first edition).

                      You can stick your head in the sand if you want to and mooch off the free editions, but I will respect the General’s wishes and dy my small part to keep the Robert’s Rules Association going by using the definitive work.

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                2. “But it’s never a bad time to educate people on the rules, as long as you do it the right way.“

                  –

                  When the organizational rules either don’t cover the issue, or does but procedures weren’t followed. Example: Rule change proposal has to be written in exact manner, gotten in by a particular time, sent out to sub-groups so they can debate, the presented at the correct time. Step 3 was missed. Doesn’t matter that the proposer did proper steps 1 & 2. But step 3 means “next year” provided steps 1, 2, and 3, are completed properly. Turns out Roberts Rules states the question “didn’t happen”. “Discussion” did, but the question does not. (Someone had to look it up. Organization did not have it under “what if”.) First time I was ever at anything that “formal” (been avoiding for 69 years). It was interesting. Yes, those responsible for step 3 fully acknowledge they messed up, big time. Did not change the outcome.

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                  1. Yeah, if the bylaws require a certain process, then not following it renders any action taken in violation of that process null and void. This isn’t something coming out of RONR specifically; rather, it’s inherent in the nature of bylaws.

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      1. I don’t recommend those, both because they’re outdated (the current version has more than 70 years of updates!) and because they’re hard to read.

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  7. Wasn’t taught it formally, but it’s awesome how it’s kind of soaked in to the culture to an extent that it’ll be informally used in a random group.

    “How many X? K, how many Y?” type stuff.

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  8. Awww, now you made me tear up a bit. My dad was not a believer in any religion (he identified himself, when pressed, vaguely as a deist). But his observance was all about Robert’s Rules. On the little local boards that he served, he was always and always the parliamentarian and sage of procedure. He also was an engineer like The Robert. There may be something to that. I read a paragraph from RR at his memorial service.

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  9. TO paraphrase Groucho Marx, I always try to avoid meeting in groups that would have me as a member. Meeting adjourned.

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    1. Those omissions help keep the meeting from being longer than it is deep – which is the usual problem with meetings. They can easily be over an hour long, but few are more than 5 minutes deep.

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        1. The classic news format is “tell them what you’re going to tell them, tell them what you’re telling them, and remind them what you just told them.” Not even kidding, that’s the taught format. (At least as of thirty years ago, but I can’t imagine that they’ve changed it.)

          If you ever look up The Phantom Edit (a fan-edit of The Phantom Menace), there’s a commentary track you can watch. He cites this particular news axiom as to why the movie as presented drags. Lucas scripted things where you heard the same information multiple times. By simply cutting to the chase, the fan editor improved the movie by a large amount. (He also made Jar Jar Binks far less annoying by simply mixing his voice DOWN from the 150% volume that it had over everybody else. What a stupid decision the original volume was!)

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          1. Aye, that was what we were taught at my junior high school, circa 1964.

            I don’t do streaming at home (geocentric satellite service doesn’t do streaming well), but I’m hotelling it mid November. Might look it up on thier bandwidth.

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      3. This should have been an email.

        I move our next dozen meetings be emails.

        Anyone like to second this motion?

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        2. Might have been guilty of that at my last job.

          Client: “Problem with XYZ”

          Me: “Why is there a problem with XYZ?”

          Client: *Long explanation*

          Me “????” pause “Can you take a picture, point out what is wrong and why you *think it is wrong. Email it to me?”

          Some clients learned … “Just email it to her with explanation. It’ll be faster. It’ll get prioritized.”

          They weren’t wrong.

          (*) FYI. Just because they thought it was wrong, does not mean it was wrong. Very often no code changes were made. But an explanation on what, how, and why, something worked that way was detailed. Never ever point out what they were doing was “wrong”. OTOH what they missed might have been noted (walks away whistling not so innocent).

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      4. To steal a line from QST`s cartoonist “Gil”, W1CJD, a meeting should be like a bridge: long enough to get the job done and no longer.

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  12. A couple of weeks ago, I looked up what happens to a motion if there is no second (it quietly dies, although it can be tabled for later). I was leading and planning to request a motion. I wanted to know what would happen if no one made it or seconded it. Now I know (sort-of).

    My current Toastmasters club is lax, so “alright then, moving on” would have sufficed. Part of that is the club. Part of it is that Toastmasters International is not as enthused about Robert’s Rules as they used to be.

    I also looked up Robert. Interesting story. His rules are 150 years old, this year.

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    1. A tricky point is that in American English, to table a motion is to decide not to consider it further (until some later date, or indefinitely), but apparently in British English to table a motion is to take it up for consideration now. This just came up in a book I am proofreading. . . .

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      1. “To table” caused a major malfunction between the Imperial staff and the US military when they were drafting their war plans in DC in early 1942. The British officers walked out in anger and got Churchill on the phone while their American counterparts were ringing Roosevelt.

        “Two nations separated by a common language.” as Churchill put it.

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      2. We had something like that when the consulting outfit I was working for was dealing with our German client. As memory serves (this was 2002, please excuse fuzzy memories), we were dealing with the difference between “a proposal” and “a concept”.

        [Will space with dashes to avoid format issues]

        Idea American—————–German

        Concept–vague, think,consider———Something to accept/reject

        Proposal—accept/reject————-think, consider

        This made initial meetings a whole lot of fun. Not.

        Added to the bit, ISA vs EISA as words. The German pronunciation for the acronyms is 180 degrees from the American. And we had to deal with both for a while. As memory serves it got to Eye-Ess-Ah vs Eee-Eye-Ess-Ah

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      3. This is one reason that the proper usage is not to “table” a motion, but to “lay [the motion] on the table”. That’s somewhat less ambiguous. It’s also worth noting that, unlike the usage of the motion in Congress, where laying something on the table effectively kills it, the RONR version of the motion is only properly used to temporarily put a matter aside so something more urgent can be considered. The assembly can take an item laid on the table back up by the motion to take from the table.

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  13. Our Guest host said

    “All in favor will raise their right hand or forefoot. All opposed same sign. The motion is carried.”

    Madam Moderator point of order. Some of us here do not have hands per se. Similarly, some of us are NOT bilaterally symmetrical so do not really have left or right manipulators (I have half a dozen unequally spaced around my body). And luckily Nadreck of Palain VII is not in the meeting ( he’s off emfoozling whatever that is) or things would get really confused. For the present, please consider my lensed member my “right” hand.

    Tregonsee L2 signing off/releasing the floor to the moderator

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    1. The Reader wonders whether Roberts Rules only apply to bilaterally symmetrical beings. He suggests you query Nadreck – you may get an incomprehensible answer in a decade or so. After all Roberts never envisioned 4 dimensional beings.

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      1. In all honesty I general I avoid querying L2 Nadreck on anything. At best you get some mass of verbiage that can mean 40 different things. At worst you get some mess that has five ideas the Lens can’t translate but simply assigns a token to it. Like Emfoozling, Lensman Samms got that from a Dextribopper (another Lens special token) on Sol’s Pluto and several centuries later we still haven’t a clue what it is. There have been tomes written suggesting it has to do with reproduction, or agriculture, or meditation/religious observation, or even just resting/entertainment.

        Could be worse, try asking Mentor something. You’ll either get answered with a question (a la one of Tellus older religions Rabbi’s) or be told you are engaged in muddy thinking and already know (or have the datum for) the answer.

        Lensman’s Load isn’t just always wading in hopeless situations. It includes putting up with stuff like that. Frankly find me 5000 Eich or Ploorans and I’ll just wade in, it’s easier…and it least it might end quickly.

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    2. ARGH!!!!!!!!!

      Parliamentarian pet peeve. “Opposed same sign” is bad, evil, and wrong, and should be abolished with prejudice. The main problem is that it doesn’t make clear to people who are opposed that saying “aye” is to vote to approve or disapprove the motion.

      Robert’s Rules of Order specifically says that the proper way to call for a voice vote is “All in favor, say aye”, followed by a wait for people to do so, then “All opposed, say no”.

      As for the rules’ applicability to those who do not have hands or feet in the human pattern, it’s up to the chair to accommodate them.

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  14. The meeting is over when I case the flag, pick it and the stand up, and turn out the lights. Y’all can keep yacking with each other out in the parking lot. I find that gets really short when it’s covered in snow and ice, or if it’s raining cats and dogs.

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  15. This meeting never closes, not really, in truth this is a exchange of ideas, ideas change, they evolve, but they never stop.

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  16. This meeting is an exchange of ideas, ideas evolve, but they never stop and the naked apes here never run out of ideas.

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  17. Seen two cases recently what happens when rules, written or not, are not followed. Interesting. One case rules were written, but a step was missed. The other, rules implied, and make sense, but nothing written (they will be). Both have to be represented correctly.

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  18. When I found myself running a meeting of our Process Improvement team at work–long story detailed in my work biography if you really care–I chose not to use Robert’s Rules of Order but to be more informal. I took on the two roles of leader and moderator, and my last order of business was to call a halt to all future meetings. :)

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    1. The (slightly modified) laws of thermodynamics apply to process improvement teams.

      You can’t win.

      You can’t break even.

      You have to play.

      Don’t ask the Reader how he knows – the rant will break WordPress.

      Liked by 4 people

      1. I found a clever way not to play. I ordered all the time allocated to our weekly meetings to one genius developer to improve our processes instead. Of course I didn’t tell management what I did. I only got away with it for the same subversive reason I was elected leader.

        Liked by 2 people

      2. This is accurate, true, and darned near gospel. Never, ever involve oneself in a process improvement team if said one values sanity. And hair. And sleep.

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  19. “Now, when an American has an idea, he directly seeks a second American to share it. If there be three, they elect a president and two secretaries. Given four, they name a keeper of records, and the office is ready for work; five, they convene a general meeting, and the club is fully constituted.”

    — Jules Verne

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  20. OK, time for me to wave my Professional Registered Parliamentarian card. (Yes, I actually earned that certification from the National Association of Parliamentarians. It’s expired, but the knowledge still applies.) That certification means that I know all 900-plus pages of the full version of Robert’s Rules of Order Newly Revised (hereafter, RONR), backwards and forwards, and can apply them – or help a presiding officer do so – in real time in a meeting. (One of the tests is that you have to locate the exact passage in RONR to answer ten different questions or parliamentary law interpretation in ten minutes.)

    The good news is that there’s lots and lots of stuff in the full RONR that doesn’t apply to the average society. There’s stuff on organizing conventions suitable for use by large national organizations. There’s stuff on disciplinary procedures for offenses committed inside, or outside of, a meeting. There’s stuff on organizing mass meetings. And so on, and so on, and so on.

    Instead, allow me to recommend an alternative: Robert’s Rules of Order Newly Revised In Brief, 3rd edition. It’s much shorter, organized so that if all you’re doing is attending a meeting you only need to read the first few chapters, and written to be readable. It’s entirely consistent with RONR, and handles the cases that are overwhelmingly common in the kind of meetings the average person participates in.

    Get the original, authoritative work. Accept no substitutes.

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    1. Would an “Expired Professional Registered Parliamentarian” card work for running a meeting of vampires or other undead?

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  21. 3 pizza’s with everything on them, 2 with everything BUT the mushrooms, 1 veggie pizza. 15 hamburgers with the normal sides on the side, then…what. You said come to order. Oh, not that kind of order. I like my meeting order better.

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