Introducing Grassroots Vermonter’s Guide to Vermont Town Meeting

Compiled by Putney Town Meeting Parliamentarian Howard Fairman, who thanks Putney Town Meeting Moderator Meg Mott for her abiding encouragement.

Click or tap here to download Grassroots Vermonter’s Guide to Vermont Town Meeting as a four-page Adobe PDF document.

“Town meeting happens every year on the first Tuesday in March. A form of government that exists nowhere else in the world outside of New England, town meeting involves direct citizen lawmaking, true government by the governed.” (Office of the Vermont Secretary of State)

Vermont Town Meeting is guided by the Constitution of the State of Vermont, Vermont Statutes and Robert’s Rules of Order implemented by an elected moderator possibly advised by an appointed parliamentarian.

Rules of order are subordinate to statutes that are subordinate to the constitution.

Learning, and remembering once or twice a year, how constitution, statutes, rules of order, moderator and voters work together during a town meeting can be challenging.

Grassroots Vermonter’s Guide to Vermont Town Meeting groups them in steps:

• Placing a warning article before town meeting.
• Discussing warning articles and other motions.
• Amending warning articles and other motions.
• Voting on warning articles and other motions.

You also can find out:

• When and how adoption or rejection of a warning article can be reconsidered or rescinded.
• When and how write-in candidates can be nominated and known to voters when no candidate is on the town-meeting ballot for a local office.
• What and why is a ‘committee of the whole.’
• Vermont has ‘voter initiative’: petitioning a town-meeting warning article.

I have quoted and cited each statute and rule of order so that you can know and share exactly what they say and where — beforehand and ‘on the floor.’

I am offering Grassroots Vermonter’s Guide to Vermont Town Meeting in the spirit of ‘knowing what we’ve got before it’s gone’ as some people advocate abolishing in-person Vermont Town Meeting.

Moving the Previous Question at a Vermont Town Meeting

This commentary is by Putney Town Meeting Parliamentarian Howard Fairman, who is not a lawyer.

“The Previous Question … immediately closes debate on … the immediately pending question” (Robert’s Rules of Order Newly Revised (12th edition, 2020) 16:1–2).

The Constitution of the State of Vermont states: “That all power being originally inherent in and co[n]sequently derived from the people, therefore, all officers of government, whether legislative or executive, are their trustees and servants; and at all times, in a legal way, accountable to them (Chapter I. A Declaration of the Rights of the Inhabitants of the State of Vermont; Article 6. [Officers servants of the people]).”

This constitutional right has been unanimously affirmed in and applied to the Vermont Open Meeting Law (1 V.S.A. §§ 310–314) by the full Supreme Court of Vermont bench in Severson v. City of Burlington (215 A.3d 102 (2019), 2019 VT 41):

“¶ 12. Vermont’s Open Meeting Law implements the command of Chapter I, Article 6 of the Vermont Constitution….

“¶ 14. When reading the Open Meeting Law as a whole, it is clear that the Legislature intended the Law to protect the public’s rights to keep public officials accountable by granting members of the public the right not only to hear, but also to be heard. As Severson points out, the Law not only requires that meetings subject to the Law be open to the public, but requires that members of the public be given a reasonable opportunity to express their views on matters considered by the public body during a public meeting. (1 V.S.A. § 312(a)(1), (h)). By ensuring that members of the public can attend meetings of public bodies, the Law also confers upon members of public bodies the right to hear from members of the public, to whom they are accountable. (Emphasis added.)

“¶ 15. Those who govern have every bit as much of an interest in open and transparent public meetings as those who are governed. To do their job properly, officers of the government need to hear from members of the public on matters being considered by a public body. Public meetings provide the opportunity for members of the public to give their input on such matters. Without the sharing of opinions and concerns, public bodies would be less able to fully and competently serve the public and construct beneficial decisions for the people.”

The Vermont Open Meeting Law defines selectboards and subordinate boards, commissions, and committees as public bodies (1 V.S.A. § 310(4)).

Vermont Town Meeting is a legislative body of registered voters to whom their elected selectboard is subordinate. By extension, a constitutional right to be heard therefore applies also to Vermont Town Meeting.

A ‘reasonable’ right to be heard necessitates defining ‘reasonable’ and whether it is an individual or a collective right.

Standard rules of order reasonably limit an individual’s right to be heard: “A member … can speak no longer than ten minutes unless he [or she] obtains the consent of the assembly” (Robert’s Rules of Order Newly Revised (12th edition, 2020) 43:8).

Limiting how many individuals shall be heard defines a collective right to be heard entailing those who have been heard speaking for those who have not been heard, whether or not they are in agreement generally or specifically.

Moreover, anyone who was not heard may have said something that would have changed minds.

Moving the Previous Question undebatably decides ‘we’ve heard enough’: arbitrarily denying others’ rights to be heard as, therefore, a collective right not necessarily exercisable by every individual that is neither stated nor implied by Severson v. City of Burlington.

If the right to be heard is an individual right as per the Constitution of the State of Vermont, moving the Previous Question is never in order at a Vermont Town Meeting. No one can vote to deny an individual constitutional right.