IBEW CODE OF CONDUCT

Parliamentary Rules

1. The chairman may save time in deciding certain questions by asking if there are any objections. If there are none, he shall declare an action adopted.
2. He shall not allow any member of the LU to speak more than once on the same subject until all members desiring the floor have spoken, and not more than twice, and not more than seven minutes at any one time, except those making reports.
3. Sectarian discussions shall not be permitted under any circumstances.
4. When members desire all talk or debate stopped and a vote taken, they may call for the previous question. When this is done it shall be put to a vote at once in this form: “Shall all debate be closed and the main question voted upon?” If this carries by a majority vote, then a vote shall be taken at once on the question before the meeting.
5. An appeal may be taken at the meeting on any ruling of the chairman, but not when a question of law is involved. When an appeal is taken to the meeting, the chairman shall state it in these words: “Shall the decision of your chairman be upheld?” The member making the appeal shall then state his grounds and the chairman shall give the reason for his decision. The vote shall then be taken without further debate.
6. A question can be reconsidered only at the same meeting or at the next regular meeting. If reconsidered at the same meeting, a majority vote is sufficient. If reconsidered at the next meeting, a two-thirds vote is required. A motion to reconsider must be made and seconded by two members who voted with the majority.
7. A motion can be amended only twice.
8. If a motion has been amended, then the amendment shall be voted upon first. If more than one amendment has been offered, then the vote shall be first on the amendment to the amendment; next on the amendment to the motion; and last on the original motion.
9. Motions to lay on the table, or to read a paper or document, or to adjourn, are not debatable.
10. All resolutions and resignations must be submitted in writing.
11. All other parliamentary questions not decided in these rules shall be decided by Robert’s Rule of Order

Robert’s Rules of Order, revised

Our parliamentary procedure, or parliamentary law as it is also called, came originally from the English Parliament; but it underwent a divergent development in each colony and state during the colonial period and the early years of the United States. As increasing numbers of voluntary societies sprang up, this divergence of practice created problems which first led Henry Robert to the study of parliamentary procedure in the 1860’s.

The San Francisco that he was ordered to as a Major of Army Engineers in 1867 was a tumultuous place, ripe for civic endeavor. Much of its population had recently come from every part of the country and, as Robert soon found, had brought varying ideas as to what was established procedure for meetings. Confronted with this multiplicity of view, Robert Realized that a standard parliamentary procedure was needed. Using the rules of the United States House of Representatives as a base, he set about developing a pocket manual that any organization might adopt, “based in its general principles upon the rules and practice of Congress, and adapted, in it’s details, to the use of ordinary societies.” Robert’s Rules of Order was the result.

It was 1876 before the original 176-page Robert’s Rules of Order became a published reality, with the full title of Pocket Manual of Rules of Order for Deliberative Assemblies. The Work received such rapid and widespread acceptance that it was soon identified with parliamentary law itself. There were two editions of the Pocket Manual in this first year of publication, the second being expanded by sixteen pages with changes and additions. In a third edition in 1893 the size of the work was brought to 218 pages.

The years 1912 to 1915 were devoted by General Robert to a complete overhauling of his Rules of Order–largely on the basis of hundreds of letters he had received for more than thirty-five years since the original publication, submitting questions of parliamentary procedure that had arisen in organizations. Robert’s Rules of Order Revised, as this general revision was entitled, was enlarged by 75 percent from the 1893 edition with less than 25 percent of its content being taken directly from that edition. The presentation of the material was completely reorganized for improved usefulness, and many topics received greatly expanded treatment. General Robert stated that much more work was put into Robert’s Rules of Order Revised than into the three previous editions of the Pocket Manual combined. Upon the publication of Robert’s Rules of Order Revised in 1915, it was almost immediately acknowledged as rendering the 1893 edition obsolete , and thus it became the work which has been familiarly known to the past two generations of users as “Robert’s Rules of Order.” Together with the original Pocket Manual, it had by 1970 run to 2,650,000 copies in print.