Roberts Rules of Order | Page 3

XIII.--Debate. § 65. Rules of speaking in
debate .................................. 150 66. Undebatable questions and those
that open the main question to debate ............................. 151
Art. XIV.--Miscellaneous. § 67. Forms of stating and putting
questions ....................... 154 68. Motions requiring a two-thirds vote
for their adoption ........................................... 154 69. Unfinished
business .......................................... 154 70.
Session ...................................................... 155 71.
Quorum ....................................................... 156 72. Order of
Business ............................................ 156 73. Amendment of
Constitutions, By-Laws and Rules of Order ...........................................

157
Legal Rights of Deliberative Assemblies ............................ 158 Table
of Rules Relating to Motions ................................. 166
Index .............................................................. 169
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INTRODUCTION.
Parliamentary Law.
Parliamentary Law refers originally to the customs and rules of
conducting business in the English Parliament; and thence to the
customs and rules of our own legislative assemblies. In England these
customs and usages of Parliament form a part of the unwritten law of
the land, and in our own legislative bodies they are of authority in all
cases where they do not conflict with existing rules or precedents.
But as a people we have not the respect which the English have for
customs and precedents, and are always ready for innovations which
we think are improvements, and hence changes have been and are
being constantly made in the written rules which our legislative bodies
have found best to adopt. As each house adopts its own rules, it results
that the two houses of the same legislature do not always agree in their
practice; even in Congress the order of precedence of motions is not the
same in both houses, and the Previous Question is admitted in the
House of Representatives, but not in the Senate. As a consequence of
this, the exact method of conducting business in any particular
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legislative body is to be obtained only from the Legislative Manual of
that body.
The vast number of societies, political, literary, scientific, benevolent
and religious, formed all over the land, though not legislative, are still
deliberative in their character, and must have some system of

conducting business, and some rules to govern their proceedings, and
are necessarily subject to the common parliamentary law where it does
not conflict with their own special rules. But as their knowledge of
parliamentary law has been obtained from the usages in this country,
rather than from the customs of Parliament, it has resulted that these
societies have followed the customs of our own legislative bodies, and
our people have thus been educated under a system of parliamentary
law which is peculiar to this country, and yet so well established as to
supersede the English parliamentary law as the common law of
ordinary deliberative assemblies.
The practice of the National House of Representatives should have the
same force in this country as the usages of the House of Commons
have in England, in determining the general principles of the common
parliamentary law of the land; but it does not follow that in every
matter of detail the rules of Congress can be appealed to as the common
law governing every deliberative assembly. In these matters of detail,
the rules of each House of Congress are adapted to their own peculiar
wants, and are of no force whatever in other assemblies.
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But upon all great parliamentary questions, such as what motions can
be made, what is their order of precedence, which can be debated, what
is their effect, etc., the common law of the land is settled by the practice
of the U. S. House of Representatives, and not by that of the English
Parliament, the U. S. Senate, or any other body.
While in extreme cases there is no difficulty in deciding the question as
to whether the practice of Congress determines the common
parliamentary law, yet between these extremes there must necessarily
be a large number of doubtful cases upon which there would be great
difference of opinion, and to avoid the serious difficulties always
arising from a lack of definiteness in the law, every deliberative
assembly should imitate our legislative bodies in adopting Rules of
Order for the conduct of their business.* [Where the practice of
Congress differs from that of Parliament upon a material point, the
common law of this country follows the practice of Congress. Thus in

every American deliberative assembly having no rules for conducting
business, the motion to adjourn would be decided to be undebatable, as
in Congress, the English parliamentary law to the contrary
notwithstanding; so if the Previous Question were negatived the debate
upon the subject would continue as in Congress, whereas in Parliament
the subject would be immediately dismissed; so too the Previous
Question could be moved when there was before the assembly a motion
either to amend, to commit, or to postpone definitely or indefinitely,
just as in