Manual of Parliamentary Practice: Rules of Proceeding and Debate in Deliberative Assemblies - Luther Stearns Cushing

Manual of Parliamentary Practice: Rules of Proceeding and Debate in Deliberative Assemblies

By Luther Stearns Cushing

  • Release Date: 2019-11-23
  • Genre: Political Science

Description

The purposes, whatever they may be, for which a deliberative assembly of any kind is constituted, can only be effected by ascertaining the sense or will of the assembly, in reference to the several subjects submitted to it, and by embodying that sense or will in an intelligible, authentic, and authoritative form. To do this, it is necessary, in the first place, that the assembly should be properly constituted and organized; and, secondly, that it should conduct its proceedings according to certain rules, and agreeably to certain forms, which experience has shown to be the best adapted to the purpose.
Some deliberative assemblies, especially those which consist of permanently established bodies, such as municipal and other corporations, are usually constituted and organized, at least, in part, in virtue of certain legal provisions; while others, of an occasional or temporary character, such as conventions and political meetings, constitute and organize themselves on their assembling together for the purposes of their appointment.
The most usual and convenient mode of organizing a deliberative assembly is the following:—The members being assembled together, in the place, and at the time appointed for their meeting, one of them addressing himself to the others, requests them to come to order; the members thereupon seating themselves, and giving their attention to him, he suggests the propriety and necessity of their being organized, before proceeding to business, and requests the members to nominate some person to act as chairman of the meeting; a name or names being thereupon mentioned, he declares that such a person (whose name was first heard by him) is nominated for chairman, and puts a question that the person so named be requested to take the chair. If this question should be decided in the negative, another nomination is then to be called for, and a question put upon the name mentioned (being that of some other person) as before, and so on until a choice is effected. When a chairman is elected, he takes the chair, and proceeds in the same manner to complete the organization of the assembly, by the choice of a secretary and such other officers, if any, as may be deemed necessary.
An organization, thus effected, may be, and frequently is, sufficient for all the purposes of the meeting; but if, for any reason, it is desired to have a greater number of officers, or to have them selected with more deliberation, it is the practice to organize temporarily, in the manner above mentioned, and then to refer the subject of a permanent organization, and the selection of persons to be nominated for the several offices, to a committee; upon whose report, the meeting proceeds to organize itself, conformably thereto, or in such other manner as it thinks proper.

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