Roger's response, FYI. ----- Original Message ----- From: "Roger Swafford" <sagitta56@mchsi.com> To: <STATE-COORD-L@rootsweb.com> Sent: Thursday, April 29, 2004 10:49 AM Subject: [STATE-COORD] Re: Proposed Bylaws Changes > Some members have expressed concern with the following points regarding the > Bylaws Revision. > > 1. A change from 2/3 majority vote to a majority vote for approval of future > bylaws amendments if the revision is adopted. > 2. The process to be used in presenting the revision to the membership for a > vote. > > Re: 1 > The ultimate authority of an organization is vested in the majority vote of > its members. When considering vote requirements for various actions to be > valid the rights of the following > must be considered - the majority, the minority, individual members and > absentees. Majority rule is the most basic principle of democracy. To permit > fewer than a majority to decide for the whole organization is to subject the > many to the rule of the few. > > Consider the following from Sturgis pg. 131 - > "Some members mistakenly assume that the higher the vote required to take an > action, the greater the protection of members. Instead, the opposite is > true. Whenever a vote of more than a majority is required to take an > action, control is taken from the majority and given to a minority. For > example, when a two-thirds vote is required, the minority need be only > one-third plus one member to defeat the proposal. Thus, a minority is > permitted to overrule the will, not only of the majority, but of almost > two-thirds of the members. If a two-thirds vote is required to pass a > proposal and 65 members vote for the proposal and 35 members vote against > it, the 35 members have won; the 65 have been defeated. This is minority, > not majority rule." > > Retaining the 2/3 requirement subjects the many to the rule of the few. A > majority is half (50% + 1 ). The example above clearly shows the existing > minority rule environment within our project. > > Re: 2 > An implication has been made that "they" are making up rules. The "they" in > this case appears to refer to the BRC. The facts of the situation are; > - more then a few amendments are needed to accomplish an update to the > bylaws > - to subject the membership to endless rounds of amendment votes, rewrites > followed by more votes is neither practical nor desired > - the bylaws provide for use of parliamentary procedure in cases not covered > in the bylaws > - the current parliamentary procedure (Sturgis) provides information for > bylaw revision. > See. http://home.mchsi.com/~sagitta56/PA.htm > > The original bylaws were presented for a single vote to adopt or reject. > There is no valid reason the revision should not be presented in the same > manner. > > Roger Swafford > BRC- Chairman > http://home.mchsi.com/~sagitta56/ > >