In
parliamentary procedure
Parliamentary procedures are the accepted Procedural law, rules, ethics, and Norm (sociology), customs governing meetings of an deliberative assembly, assembly or organization. Their object is to allow orderly deliberation upon questions of inte ...
, a substitute amendment is an
amendment
An amendment is a formal or official change made to a law, contract, constitution, or other legal document. It is based on the verb to amend, which means to change for better. Amendments can add, remove, or update parts of these agreements. They ...
that replaces a portion or all of the wording in a proposal.
Legislatures
In
legislatures
A legislature (, ) is a deliberative assembly with the legal authority to make laws for a political entity such as a country, nation or city on behalf of the people therein. They are often contrasted with the executive and judicial powers ...
, a substitute amendment kills a bill by replacing it if the amendment is passed.
Legislative bodies sometimes have special rules regarding this type of amendment. For example, the
Continental Congress
The Continental Congress was a series of legislature, legislative bodies, with some executive function, for the Thirteen Colonies of British America, Great Britain in North America, and the newly declared United States before, during, and after ...
had a rule stating: "No new motion or proposition shall be admitted under color of amendment as a substitute for a question or proposition under debate until it is postponed or disagreed to."
United States Congress
In the
United States Congress
The United States Congress is the legislature, legislative branch of the federal government of the United States. It is a Bicameralism, bicameral legislature, including a Lower house, lower body, the United States House of Representatives, ...
, substitute amendments are often used to replace the text of a bill that is no longer being considered with the text of an unrelated bill. In this case, it is said that the former bill is being used as a legislative vehicle for the latter. This has the effect of skipping steps of the legislative process, such as the need for a bill to be passed by a
Congressional committee. This is possible because there is no general requirement that amendments offered by senators on the floor must be germane or relevant to the bill being considered.
Other assemblies
In other
deliberative assemblies, using
Robert's Rules of Order
''Robert's Rules of Order'', often simply referred to as ''Robert's Rules'', is a manual of parliamentary procedure by U.S. Army officer Henry Martyn Robert (1837–1923). "The object of Rules of Order is to assist an assembly to accomplish the ...
, a substitute amendment is a form of the
motion to amend. It could be
debated, modified, and voted on like other amendments.
A substitute can be a sentence, paragraph, section, or article within a
motion
In physics, motion is when an object changes its position with respect to a reference point in a given time. Motion is mathematically described in terms of displacement, distance, velocity, acceleration, speed, and frame of reference to an o ...
or
resolution, or it can be the entire motion or resolution.
It could be used to improve a poorly worded motion or resolution which helps to pass it.
Procedure
When a substitute is proposed, both the substitute and the wording of the motion that is being substituted for are considered.
In this case, the substitute could be amended and the original motion could be amended.
Then a vote is taken on whether to put the substitute (with any modifications) in place of the original motion (with any modifications).
This makes it fair for the proponents of the original motion (if only the substitute could be considered and passed, then the proponents of the original motion wouldn't get a chance to advocate and possibly improve their motion if that was the case).
If the substitute amendment passed, the main motion as amended would still need to be voted on.
See also
*
Shell bill A shell bill is a legislative bill, typically with no substantive provisions, that is introduced for purposes of later being amended to include the actual legislative proposals advanced by the introducer. This device is used for a number of purpos ...
*
Amend (motion)
In parliamentary procedure, the motion to amend is used to modify another motion. An amendment could itself be amended. A related procedure is filling blanks in a motion.
Explanation and use
Using Robert's Rules of Order
''Robert's Rules of ...
References
{{Parliamentary Procedure
Subsidiary motions