Published in the ECHO Journal, May 2009
Have you ever had to chair a meeting? Scary, isn’t it?
Whether you are a past president or a newly‑elected president, you must appreciate the daunting challenge for the person who holds the gavel. How do you apply democratic principles in a fair and efficient way—without messing up too badly?
It’s a tough job, and the job is tougher if you do not have a firm grasp of “parliamentary procedure,” often called “Robert’s Rules of Order” after the popular manual on the subject.
Over the years, I have compiled a list of the most popular misunderstandings, or “myths,” that some people hold regarding proper parliamentary procedure, particularly, myths that conflict with the current edition of Robert’s Rules, namely, “Robert’s Rules of Order Newly Revised” (10th edition, 2000, published by Perseus Publishing). For this article, I have edited my master list of parliamentary myths down to four myths that explicitly involve the presiding officer or chairman.
Below is a list of statements that are all “false.” That is, each statement is my paraphrase of a “myth” that some people hold regarding what they think Robert’s Rules of Order has to say on the subject.
Beware: A superior rule (e.g., state law, articles of incorporation or bylaws) always supersedes the rule in a parliamentary authority such as Robert’s Rules of Order. So if your organization has a written customized rule that says otherwise, or if your state’s corporate code has a rule that applies, then that rule must be obeyed. The rules in one’s parliamentary authority only apply if your superior rules are silent or not in conflict.
Here is my list of myths and my commentary:
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Chairs Cannot Vote.
False, but with a grain of truth. A chair who is a true member of the body that is meeting never loses the ordinary rights of membership merely by acting as the presiding officer. However, while acting as the presiding officer, the duties of chairmanship demand that the chair establish an air impartiality, even if the chair does not feel impartial regarding the pending motion. Impartiality demands that the chair not debate while acting as the presiding officer. But note that a chair, when voting, may always vote by ballot, since a secret ballot preserves the impartiality of the chair. When voting by voice or by hand or by rising, the chair votes last or not at all, and then only if his single vote will make a difference in the outcome, like changing a tie into a one‑vote majority (i.e., to change a motion’s loss into an adoption) or to change a one‑vote majority into a tie (i.e., to change a motion’s adoption into a loss). This rule of the chair’s voting is relaxed for small boards (less than a dozen members or so) and committees, where the chair is often the most vocal debater and who will likely vote along with the rest of the members.
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Chairs May Vote a Second Time to Break a Tie.
False. The principle is: one man, one vote. A tie is a loss for most ordinary motions; so, technically, there is nothing to break. An exception to this “tie = loss” equation would be an election, where a tie results in no winner. But still there is never a second vote for the chair.
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A Chair, After Asking for the Ayes and the Nays, Should Ask For the Abstentions.
False. Abstentions are never called for. Abstentions are treated like so much scrap paper and are never counted toward the ayes nor the nays. The exception would be a custom rule or law that demands that all decisions made have a certain number of voters participating or a certain percentage of votes. Absent any such rule, abstentions count neither toward the affirmative nor the negative. Here is an extreme example: In a meeting of 100 members entitled to vote, if 99 members abstain, then a vote may be recorded, properly, as 1-0 (adoption) or 0‑1 (rejection) and is just as binding as a vote of 100‑0 or 0‑100.
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The Chair Controls the Agenda.
False. Certainly, the creation of the agenda must be done by someone, and typically this duty falls to the president or to the secretary. Ultimately, the agenda is the property and responsibility of the sitting body itself, to tailor its own agenda to suit its needs. Ordinarily, items of business may be added, deleted, and moved around by a majority vote, or by general consent, prior to adoption of the agenda. After adoption of the agenda, to amend the agenda takes a two-thirds vote. Even easier, if your agenda includes the standard order of business as recommended by Robert’s Rules of Order, then there will be a class of business called “new business.” If this class of business is in your agenda, then there is no need to modify the agenda at the top of the meeting. The chair may simply prompt the members for their business when the meeting reaches “new business.”
Those are the common myths that I have logged over the years regarding presiding officers and chairmanship. To repeat my warning: If you have a law or a rule that applies, then that law/rule always overrules a rule in one’s parliamentary manual.
Kim Goldsworthy is a professional registered parliamentarian and a certified parliamentarian.