1025. Have you ever wondered where meeting terms like “quorum” or “proxy” come from? In this episode, Jim Slaughter looks at the linguistic origins and historical contexts of these and other common parliamentary words. We discuss the evolution of words like “bylaws,” why minutes aren't related to time, how “filibuster” is connected to pirates, and why “majority” is often misunderstood.
1025. Have you ever wondered where meeting terms like “quorum” or “proxy” come from? In this episode, Jim Slaughter looks at the linguistic origins and historical contexts of these and other common parliamentary words. We discuss the evolution of words like “bylaws,” why minutes aren't related to time, how “filibuster” is connected to pirates, and why “majority” is often misunderstood.
Jim Slaughter is an attorney, Certified Professional Parliamentarian, Professional Registered Parliamentarian, and past President of the American College of Parliamentary Lawyers. He is the author of four books on meeting procedure, including two recent books updated for the new Robert’s—Robert’s Rules of Order Fast Track and Notes and Comments on Robert’s Rules, Fifth Edition. Jim has served as Parliamentarian for many of the largest associations in the world. An array of charts and articles on Robert’s and meeting procedure can be found at www.jimslaughter.com.
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LIGHTLY EDITED TRANSCRIPT
Mignon: Grammar Girl here.
I'm Mignon Fogarty, and today we're going to talk about words related to meetings.
And I'm here with Jim Slaughter, who is the president of Law Firm Carolinas and a big deal parliamentarian.
He is a professional registered parliamentarian, past president of the American College of Parliamentary Lawyers, and a parliamentarian to many of the largest trade and professional associations in the country.
He's written four books on Robert's Rules of Order and running proper meetings, including two recent books updated for the latest Roberts: "Robert's Rules of Order Fast Track" and "Notes and Comments on Robert's Rules, Fifth Edition."
Jim Slaughter, welcome to the Grammar Girl podcast.
Jim: Thank you, Mignon.
Mignon: Yeah, so you are really into meetings, and we're going to talk about the words related to meetings, but you know, why is this also important?
Jim: When you think about all the meetings in the United States, you've got unions, you've got religious institutions, you have nonprofits, you have charities, homeowner associations.
There really are millions of meetings in the United States every year.
And by knowing the words that get used in those meetings, because it's almost like a trade language.
By knowing the right words in those meetings, people that go to the meetings can look like they know what they are doing and they are more likely to get done what they want accomplished at the meeting.
Mignon: Right, so I feel like the last time I thought about parliamentary procedure was probably in high school, and maybe some group I was in.
Where does this get used in the adult world today?
Jim: Lots of people are introduced to it in high school, but think of all the places where businesses or associations meet to transact business.
Again, it would include religious institutions and church meetings.
It would include unions, trade associations.
Almost all of the nonprofits and charities in the United States have boards of director meetings.
Many of them have membership meetings.
So there are many places in life ranging from the PTA to a homeowner's association where you might show up and suddenly realize, oh, that's that parliamentary procedure thing that I was introduced into a little bit when I was in high school.
Mignon: Yeah, tell me how you help organizations like do this better.
Jim: Well, as a parliamentarian, which again is one of those words since you love words, in many parts of the world, a parliamentarian is someone who is an elected official and serves in a parliament.
You'll see that in lots of countries in the United States.
A parliamentarian is someone who helps with meeting procedure.
They advise the presiding officer on how to run a good meeting because there are legal aspects to running an effective meeting where you might think you did something and you did not, but for today's purposes, let's just say proper words and procedure can make meetings shorter.
And again, it can make you look like you know what you are doing at a meeting, which is important too.
Mignon: If you run a meeting improperly, according to parliamentary procedure, can that cause a legal problem?
Jim: It can. It depends on the specific issue.
Like anything else, I mean, there are little errors, there are big errors, but if you do something like, if you don't call a meeting properly, if you don't wait until there are enough people at the meeting for it to be able to make decisions, if you take the wrong vote, as you can imagine, those can lead to legal issues, but let's not focus on the legal issues.
Let's just say that good procedure will make meetings shorter and it will make them fair.
Mignon: Fair, that's always good. And what are Robert's Rules of Order? Like, I've definitely heard of that, but how does it relate to parliamentary procedure?
Jim: Well, most people think Robert's rules of order and parliamentary procedure are synonymous.
They are not.
Parliamentary procedure is everything that goes into running a legal and an effective meeting.
Robert's Rules of Order is a book on parliamentary procedure.
It was first written by an Army Corps of Engineer, ended up being a Brigadier General in the Union Army in 1876 named Henry Martin Robert.
He wrote his first book.
It was about 176 pages and it was about this small.
Mignon: Oh, he's holding up a book. It's very thin.
Jim: I'm sorry, that's right. For those on the podcast, it's 176 pages because he wanted something that would go into your pocket.
What a lot of people don't realize, they think this is some old book. It's actually updated about every 10 years. So the current Robert's Rules of Order is the 12th edition and it's 714 pages.
Mignon: That's a door stopper. It looks more like the Chicago Manual Style.
Jim: Not quite as thin, but most people don't need to know everything in this book.
They just need to know enough to run a meeting.
This is like an encyclopedia of meetings.
So there's something in here about everything, but you don't have to use everything in this book to run a good meeting.
Mignon: Wow, I can see why you would need to be certified, though, on like knowing all that. It's a lot to know.
Jim: Well, and Roberts is the 800-pound gorilla of the parliamentary world used by most organizations, but different groups use different books.
So lots of legislatures use a book called Demeters. Lots of physicians and medical groups, dental groups use a book called the Standard Code of Parliamentary Procedure. So Roberts is not the only game in town.
It's just the best num.
Mignon: Huh, is that like the difference between like the Chicago Manual of Style and the MLA and the AP stylebook?
Do people have sort of their allegiances or are different books like, you know, formatted specifically for different industries?
Jim: That's correct.
For the groups that use those different books, it tends to be there's something about the process in those books they like more.
But again, without question, Roberts is by far the most common and most used parliamentary authority in the United States.
Mignon: Fascinating, yeah.
Well, I'm getting sidetracked, but this is all so interesting, but we are here to talk about the words. The words that, there's so many interesting words that fall under parliamentary procedure.
Why don't we start with "bylaws"?
Jim: Well, "bylaws" is a good one to start with, because the bylaws for an organization are the documents that govern it.
It used to be called the constitution or the constitution and bylaws.
"Bylaws" used to have a hyphen in it, "By" hyphen "laws."
But the history on it's kind of interesting.
I know you did a podcast once on Old English and Middle English.
It's actually a Norse word, "by" appears in some English cities like Whitby and Derby. And I'm told that means that it was settled by Vikings.
The word by means "village or town."
And so if you break it down "bylaws," just really mean the town laws.
And nowadays that's what associations and other bodies have.
It's their governing documents.
Mignon: Isn't that great?
I would have thought for sure that "bylaw" would have been "by" the preposition, "by the law." But it actually means the town law. That's so great.
What are some of the other words that are, interesting words that are commonly used in the meetings?
Jim: And you asked me to pull a couple of words that you don't have to know these words to go to a meeting. But it adds some flavor to the meeting.
And again, a lot of people walk into meetings and they'll hear "bylaws" or they'll hear "quorum" or they'll hear "majority." And if it's not a word you're familiar with, it can be a very foreign experience.
And so by knowing some of the words, it makes it a better meeting and you'll have a better feeling for what's going on.
"Quorum" is another word that comes up. And "quorum" is a Latin word.
For meetings, it means how many people have to be there for it to be a legal meeting? How many people need to show up before you start voting on things?
Because you don't want to be voting on things without enough people there for it to be representative for the group.
"Quorum" just means "of whom"?
And basically in England and olden times when they would appoint justices of the peace, the commission appointing them would say that either one of them or some of them had to be present before they could transact any business.
And that's pretty much what it means for meetings, which is we want enough people here so that it's not some small group making a decision on behalf of the big group that is unrepresentative.
You always want a quorum before you start voting on things at a meeting.
Mignon: Right, and then you talked about majority.
Like if you want a majority of that quorum, it doesn't mean what everyone, a lot of people think it means, right? And the history is not as exciting.
Jim: It comes from majority, but it's used wrong so often.
I'm happy you raised it.
And by that I mean, I hear on excellent news stations or reporting on Congress or governmental meetings that usually majority will be said to mean 51%. It does not mean that.
Or I will hear that it means "half plus one." It also doesn't mean that.
"Majority" just means more than half. So depending on the size of your group or depending on whether you have fractional interests, "majority" might just be 50.0001%.
And if you use one of those other numbers, I just threw out, you're very likely gonna end up with a wrong number.
Mignon: So "majority" just means "more than half," however small that might be, right? So if you have 100% then 51% is more than half. But if you have 1,000 people, it might be, I don't know, 50.05%? I don't know! Grammar Girl does math. Don't trust my math!
Jim: You're not maybe better than mine, but yes, if it's 1,000 people, a majority will have 500, it would probably be 501 unless you're voting fractionally.
But let's say there are 1,001 people. Ooh, well half is 500 and a half.
Well, if you said majority is 51%, you're gong to get a wrong number. If you say it's half plus add a whole another one, that's wrong too.
Again, a "majority" just means more than half, however small that might be.
Mignon: Yeah, and since we're on math terms, you mentioned "division." That sounded like another interesting word.
Jim: It is mainly because it's so visual. In a meeting, frequently votes are taken by the chair asking would all those in favor say aye. Would all those opposed say no?
No, and it's often very clear. But if it's not clear, anybody can, under Roberts can ask for a division. A division just means I just want to see the vote. I'd like to divide the room. I'd like to everybody who's in favor to stand. I'd like everybody who's opposed to stand.
We're not going to count. We're just going to eyeball it.
But the word "division" comes from parliament where there are actually two separate doors in the back of the room, where when they do a division or divide the house, different members go to a different door and walk in through separate instances in the room and get counted, somewhat like maybe cattle.
Mignon: So I've never been in a meeting like this. So people are physically getting up and moving around?
Jim: Well, again, that's parliament dividing by doors.
But in the United States and in typical parliamentary procedure, these days you're in Roberts, all a division these days means is, hey, now that we did a voice vote, it wasn't clear enough.
Let's just have everybody stand up who's in favor and sit down, everybody who's opposed, stand up and sit down and we'll do a quick eyeball.
But the history of the word division, because you might wonder, why is this called a division?
Is it actually comes from a time when the yeses and the noes were actually divided in the room?
Mignon: And in what in Zoom meetings, do they have people like digitally raise their hands or something like that?
Jim: If you're in a virtual meeting, you're exactly right.
Because you've been on lots of meetings virtually as everybody else has these days.
There is a device within the Zoom meeting where you can raise hands.
And sometimes in virtual meetings, people will send in their vote as a text message so that you have a recording of it permanently.
The main issue with virtual meetings, which we may talk about in a bit, is there needs to be some basis for doing a virtual meeting.
There either needs to be a statute that allows you to do it or there needs to be something in the bylaws 'cause a virtual meeting is not automatically the same as an in-person meeting.
Mignon: Something in those bylaws in the town law. So is it true that there is no next order of business?
Jim: Well, I know you and I chatted just briefly about that one.
You will regularly, regularly, in almost any meeting you go to, and it's almost something that's used outside of meetings now where someone will make reference to the next order of business.
And without getting too complicated here, there is one order of business for a meeting.
The order of business is a type of an agenda, but it's everything that's gonna happen in that meeting generally from the beginning when the meeting's called to order all the way to the adjournment.
And so there's one order of business.
And so they say the next order of business is sort of like saying the next week of the day.
It's backwards.
The proper phrase in Roberts, and you will not find the phrase next order of business in Roberts, a better phrase would be something like the next item of business because there's just one order of business.
Again, the parliamentary police are not going to show up at your meeting and do something if you use the wrong term on these, but if you're running a meeting, you may want to use the right phrases so that people understand that you know something about running a meeting.
Mignon: I'm imagining the parliamentary police.
Jim: You don't imagine that. It's horrifying, it's horrifying. (laughing)
Mignon: Did they have gavels on their belts? Tri-corner hats?
So you mentioned "adjournment." You told me that was an interesting word too.
Jim: Well, only in that again, it's a word that's thrown around a lot inside and outside of meetings. We're going to adjourn. There's an adjournment for a meeting.
All an adjournment means, or to adjourn just means at the end of the meeting, that's how you bring it to an end.
But my understanding is that it's a regionally Latin, but it's a French phrase as well.
And I'm horrible at French, but it's basically, adjournment, bonjour, g'day.
The "jour" part is the day; it's to a day to reconvene the meeting.
So put all together, again, the phrase basically instead of ending a meeting, it was sort of announcing, we're finishing this one up and then we will be getting it together at a later date.
Mignon: Yeah, it comes from the word "day." Yeah, so it's like, and daybreak or dawn is the same root. The root means "daybreak" or "dawn" or "day."
And it was about like having, the continuing the meeting the next day, which I thought was interesting and lovely.
Jim: And this is your world, but my understanding is the D got added basically accidentally or by mistake, there doesn't really need to be a D in the word, but that's the way it is.
Mignon: Oh, that happens. I love those stories.
Yeah, and so we missed Talk Like a Pirate Day, but "filibuster" is just, we have to talk about it because it's this wonderful word that relates to meetings or at least government and it has ties to pirates.
Jim: It does indeed.
And again, it's not really a Roberts word. It's not in these parliamentary books.
And that's because Roberts, for instance, doesn't let anybody talk for more than 10 minutes. And frequently the rules of a meeting are shorter than that.
What a filibuster is for those who haven't experienced it is in the US Senate. A filibuster is where you talk something to death and that's because they don't have time limits. And so you can keep talking.
And in fact, there's a famous movie that's quite old at this point called "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" with Jimmy Stewart in it. And one of the plot lines is that to try and stop something, he starts speaking in the US Senate and he will not stop. And he talks for days and it shuts everything down.
And the word "filibuster," although that's not a Roberts word, it is an interesting word. And the point you were making about pirates is apparently the word filibuster comes from "filibustris."
It's a West Indian term for a small type of a boat, which I believe is a "flibote."
And the idea was these little boats could harass, they could annoy, they could go around bigger ships.
And basically they could just cause all sorts of trouble, which is kind of a vivid image of what a filibuster in the United States Senate would be.
It's someone in the minority who gets the floor and won't give it up and they're using pirate-like or disorderly or lawless tactics to try to get their way. So it's a very visual word when you think of it as piratical.
Mignon: Right. Yeah. And then the word about the boat, it goes back ultimately to the Dutch to "freebooter."
I think, I don't know how to say it in the Dutch, but it's what pirates were called. And it literally means free booty, like free plunder. And "boot" is really an interesting word because there are three different kinds of boot.
So there's the boot, at least … probably more … there's the boot you wear on your foot, and that comes from one origin.
And then there's a type of boot that I thought might be the origin of "booty," which is it means "extra." So like if you say, "Oh, we're having ice cream, but then we're getting sprinkles to boo," that meaning of boot comes from, I think, an old, old English word that means "to make something better."
And in business deals, you can also have the boot, which is extra money that you're considered, you know, money or stuff that you give to sort of sweeten the deal.
But then "booty," which is what pirates get actually comes from a third origin. So, and that meant, oh, I have to look at it. It meant it's just completely different.
So, but to filibuster also goes back to pirates and their free booty.
Jim: Which again, the word is thrown around a lot without knowing the history. You don't have to know it to know what the word means, but it sort of adds color to it.
Once you get all this history, I'll even mention that the US Congress, as I understand it, also used to allow people to talk indefinitely until a particular congressman in the early 1800s apparently took them up on that.
And Congress passed a rule that limited debate to one hour, and I always thought it would be interesting to be the person who gets asked, you know, what was your contribution in Congress.
And the answer is, well, I talked so much that they adopted a rule that wouldn't allow people to talk forever anymore.
Mignon: Today he would have been a podcaster.
So how about the, one of the words on your list was "ex officio," and I don't think I know how to use that word.
Jim: Well, and that's a Latin word only seen sometimes not really in meetings, but it has to do with organizations, and an ex officio member is someone who has not been elected to a position, but, but they're in a position because of some other office they hold like the governor might be an ex officio member of a school board of trustees, or a treasurer might be an ex officio member of the finance committee, and ex officio just means "out of or from officio, office."
So it's Latin, and it basically means I'm serving out of this office that I serve, meaning I'm on the committee because I'm treasurer and if I resign as treasurer and someone else comes in as treasurer, they're now going to serve in this position instead of me because you're serving on it because of some other office that you hold.
Mignon: Yeah, so it's essentially the office that serves instead of the person and they were not elected they're serving because of this other office.
Jim: So yes, that's correct.
Mignon: And what about "abstain"?
Jim: Abstain is to not vote in parliamentary procedure you don't have to you don't have to vote you could vote in favor of something you could vote against something, but you also have the option of not voting if it's a voice vote you just stay quiet.
And it's Middle English as I understand it from Old French "abstenir" which basically is the same background as "abstinence" and it and in the parliamentary world "to abstain" means "I choose not to vote."
Some chairs will actually call on those who wish to abstain, but the parliamentary books say don't do that because these people don't wish to have attention drawn to themselves and don't wish to vote, so don't don't make it part of the vote.
Mignon: I thought it was interesting that it was first used in the "not drinking alcohol" sense, so the original meaning, you know, was to not drink alcohol, and then it was in 1796 that it was first used to talk about not voting.
Jim: So the alcohol connection was around far longer than the meeting connection it sounds like.
Mignon: Right. Yeah. Now what is "proxy"? An abbreviation?
Jim: It is, and it's a good one probably. "Proxy" is also a Latin word in countries as I understand it that follow Roman law or again in Rome, it's an agent who represents other people in court, and the long word or the official word as I understand it is "procurator," which I'm going to say very slowly because I can mess that up, and a procurator is someone who is practicing procuracy, and a "proxy" is a much better and easier way to say either of those two long words. I'm not going to try again.
Mignon: And so a proxy.
Jim: Go ahead.
Mignon: So a proxy is someone you send to do something on your behalf?
Jim: At a meeting, so much like I said it's someone who represents someone else in court, I could send Mignon as my proxy, if it's allowed by statute, I could send Mignon as a proxy to a meeting to speak on my behalf, or maybe I will just give her authority to to vote on my behalf. But if she goes to the meeting, it counts as though I'm at the meeting, and she is there on my behalf as proxy.
Mignon: And the origin of that one is interesting too. It comes from a word that means "to manage." And so "proxy" is also related to "procure." So if you procure something you're sort of … it goes back to the idea of managing that process or getting what you need.
Jim: It makes sense to me, and I like the abbreviation, but I have pondered that I have never in my life ever encountered the word "procurator" or "procuracy" used in normal English.
Mignon: Right. Right, now one we have to talk about that is really interesting because a lot of people get confused about it is to "table" something. You know, I have been in meetings where people talk about tabling things, just regular, you know, business meetings, but not everyone is sure what it means.
Jim: Well, and that's one of those words I was mentioning a bit ago. It's sort of like calling the previous question or to move the previous question which is a way you close debate.
"Table" is another one of those words that if you don't have the secret handshake, you may wonder what are they talking about.
And in America to table a motion, and it's a very visual motion. "To table" means to basically put something on a table that you're going to come back to later, meaning it is a motion to temporarily delay something while you're handling something of more importance.
But when you mention it's got some interestingness to it. In different parts of the world, it means completely different things. In England and in Parliament, to table something means to put it on the table so that we will now begin consideration of it.
And the exact opposite is true in Roberts Rules of Order in the United States where normally, "table" means "to delay or to get rid of something," so it's the reverse of the same word.
Mignon: Yeah, no. I've seen British people and American people who said I always thought this meant the opposite because they mean the opposite in British English and American English. You can think about in British English is as if the table is in front of you or in the middle of the circle of where everyone is meeting. So you're putting it on the table to bring it forward. And in American English, it's more like the table is off to the side way in the back, and we're just going to put it on the table and maybe forget about it.
Jim: And so if you visit Parliament as an American or if you're watching C-SPAN in Europe, you might wonder why is this the complete reverse of what I think it is, but I think it was George Bernard Shaw who said that we were two countries divided by a common language.
In fact, you asked about parliamentarians earlier. I'll mention that in the United States, a parliamentarian is someone who advises on parliamentary procedure, but in many parts of the world, if you show up and say "I'm a parliamentarian," they would assume that means you're an elected official because you were a member of that government's parliament.
And so yet again a word that means very different things depending on where you are.
Mignon: Interesting. You have to be careful how you introduce yourself to people in other countries, Jim.
Let's finish up this main section talking about the word "minutes" because the minutes of a meeting were interesting too.
Jim: And minutes sounds to me some of those you said earlier. If you had to figure it out, if I had to figure it out on my own, I think, "Oh, minutes. Of course, minutes are a record of what was done at the meeting. It's sort of a shorthand version of everything that happened at the meeting. And it is not a record of what was said; it is a record of what was done, but of course, minutes. So we're keeping minutes because that means the time somehow we're writing down what we did with our time." But that's not really what it comes from at all. It's a Latin term that means "minuta scriptura," and that just means "small notes," which is a pretty good description of what it is. It's just small notes about what happened at the meeting, but it's not based on time or have anything to do with time.
Mignon: Yeah I would have guessed it was that's that's great.
Well, thank you so much for joining us. Our Grammarpalooza subscribers, our premium subscribers, are going to get an additional segment. At the end we're going to talk about synchronous versus asynchronous meetings and who was this Roberts guy? Roberts Rules of Order. And some of Jim's book recommendations but for the rest of you, thanks for joining us, and Jim, where can people find you?
Jim: For parliamentary procedure, our firm's website is www.jimslaughter.com. There's lots of free resources there: charts, article,s and information on the parliamentary organizations in the country.
Mignon: Thank you so much.