Thursday, April 25, 2013
The dreaded "Ninth Order"
Several news items about the Wash Legislature mention that the Senate may have to resort to a "rare parliamentary tactic" known as the Ninth Order. This wasn't elucidated or explained in the news items. It sounded so medieval and threatening that I wanted to find out more. Is it like Room 101? A secret fraternal society like Opus Dei or Knights Templar? The Ninth Circle of Hell?
It's not part of Robert's Rules. All Google refs to the phrase in a parliamentary context come right back to the Wash Senate, still without explanation.
So I searched the Wash Legislature webpage and located it under Senate Resolution 8601, defining the Senate Rules:
Most of those Orders don't really happen anyway; legislative sessions are rapid-fire sequences of push-button votes, with constantly repeated mentions of phrases like first reading, second reading and third reading. The Orders are slurred-over filler verbiage like an auctioneer's WholllllgimmeTenTenTenLevenLevenLeven and DoIHearFiveFiveFive.(Watch a typical recent example)
Even so, the Orders apparently have a meaning in the bizarre minds of the senators. And in those bizarre minds, introducing a bill during "presentation of motions" is drastic and unusual. That's as far as I can take it. Still don't know why this particular bill has to be placed into the dreaded Ninth Order.
¶ 3:52 AM 
Most of those Orders don't really happen anyway; legislative sessions are rapid-fire sequences of push-button votes, with constantly repeated mentions of phrases like first reading, second reading and third reading. The Orders are slurred-over filler verbiage like an auctioneer's WholllllgimmeTenTenTenLevenLevenLeven and DoIHearFiveFiveFive.(Watch a typical recent example)
Even so, the Orders apparently have a meaning in the bizarre minds of the senators. And in those bizarre minds, introducing a bill during "presentation of motions" is drastic and unusual. That's as far as I can take it. Still don't know why this particular bill has to be placed into the dreaded Ninth Order.
¶ 3:52 AM
