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In a recent assembly of delegates, an amendment was made/carried to a resolution that was subsequently adopted. The problem I have is that this now puts in our organization's core beliefs section a statement which is demonstrably false: "Biologically, all people are born male or female."

After passage, there was a motion to reconsider which failed. Then, an expert in the field (a physician) stood up and pointed this false statement out in a motion to suspend the rules to allow for yet another vote to reconsider in an effort to get the false statement removed. The motion to suspend the rules failed.

My question then is this: Is there any point of order that can be called to bring this up again and strike the false statement?

The issue was resolved by the presiding board over the assembly and ultimately the resolution was referred for further study because of other issues involved in the resolution. Thanks.

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    I think you have an XY problem. You want the group to acknowledged your facts, but Robert's rules are about how a group makes a group decision and have nothing to do with facts or proof. Pi has sometimes been declared 3 and that is trivial to demonstrate as false with no prep or education.
    – user9389
    Jun 28, 2017 at 18:44
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    Somewhat tangential, but what specific objection did people have to your corrections (and what WERE your corrections?). E.g. was the objection more of "almost all, but there's some rare exceptions"? or "i'm talking about gender identification and not biological sex" (in which case, that may be why people rejected your amendment).
    – user4012
    Jun 28, 2017 at 19:34
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    Was there no body that scrutinises motions beforehand to rule out of order the motion on one of several grounds ie "this meeting aggress that PI = 3"
    – Neuromancer
    May 24, 2018 at 21:38

1 Answer 1

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There's no point of order you can bring, unless your organization has special bylaws. Robert's Rules allows your assembly to do dumb things if it wants to.

You might be able to make a motion to rescind. If you bring such a motion without advance notice, it needs either 2/3 of those present or a majority of the entire membership (including those NOT present.) With advance notice it just needs a simple majority.

I say "might" only because of the history, where there's already been a motion to reconsider and a motion to suspend the rules to reconsider again. I question why you think a fourth vote would have a different result than the first three. It's possible your motion would be considered dilatory.

See http://www.rulesonline.com/rror-06.htm

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    I don't have any scientific backing for this, but I have plenty experience to no that repeated use of motions to try and address a topic that was considered settled often will cause more support to block the motion than the initial vote on the subject. There are some people who may support your change, but not your inability to accept the decision of the deliberative body at this time (try again when there's some new faces).
    – hszmv
    Nov 25, 2019 at 19:05

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