ny special subject with
safety.

To aid in quickly referring to as many as possible of the rules relating
to each motion, there is placed immediately before the Index, a Table of
Rules, which enables one, without turning a page, to find the answers to
some two hundred questions. The Table of Rules is so arranged as to
greatly assist the reader in systematizing his knowledge of
parliamentary law.

The second part is a simple explanation of the common methods of
conducting business in ordinary

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meetings, in which the motions are classified according to their uses,
and those used for a similar purpose compared together. This part is
expressly intended for that large class of the community, who are
unfamiliar with parliamentary usages and are unwilling to devote much
study to the subject, but would be glad with little labor to learn
enough to enable them to take part in meetings of deliberative
assemblies without fear of being out of order. The object of Rules of
Order in deliberative assemblies, is to assist an assembly to accomplish
the work for which it was designed, in the best possible manner. To do
this, it is necessary to somewhat restrain the individual, as the right
of an individual in any community to do what he pleases, is incompatible
with the best interests of the whole. Where there is no law, but every
man does what is right in his own eyes, there is the least of real
liberty. Experience has shown the importance of definiteness in the
law; and in this country, where customs are so slightly established and
the published manuals of parliamentary practice so conflicting, no
society should attempt to conduct business without having adopted some
work upon the subject, as the authority in all cases not covered by
their own rules.

It has been well said by one of the greatest of English writers on
parliamentary law: "Whether these forms be in all cases the most
rational or not is really not of so great importance. It is much more
material that there should be a rule to go by, than what that rule is,
that there may be a uniformity of proceeding in business, not subject to
the caprice of the chairman, or captiousness of the members. It is very
material that order, decency and regularity be preserved in a dignified
public body."

H. M. R.
December, 1875.

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