Manual of Parliamentary Practice / Rules of Proceeding and Debate in Deliberative Assemblies

RULES OF PROCEEDING AND DEBATE IN DELIBERATIVE ASSEMBLIES.
BY LUTHER S. CUSHING.
REVISED BY FRANCES P. SULLIVAN.
Copyright, 1887, BY M. J. IVERS & CO.
NEW YORK: M. J. IVERS & CO. 379 Pearl Street
The following treatise forms a part only of a much larger and more comprehensive work, covering the whole ground of parliamentary law and practice, which the author has for some time been engaged in preparing; and which it is his intention to complete and publish, as soon as possible. In the mean time, this little work has been compiled, chiefly from the larger, at the request of the publishers, and to supply a want which was supposed to exist to a considerable extent.
The only work which has hitherto been in general use in this country, relating to the proceedings of legislative assemblies, is the compilation originally prepared by Mr. Jefferson, when vice-president of the United States, for the use of the body over which he presided, and which is familiarly known as Jefferson’s Manual . This work, having been extensively used in our legislative bodies, and, in some States, expressly sanctioned by law, may be said to form, as it were, the basis of the common parliamentary law of this country. Regarding it in that light, the author of the following treatise has considered the principles and rules laid down by Mr. Jefferson (and which have been adopted by him chiefly from the elaborate work of Mr. Hatsell) as the established rules on this subject, and has accordingly made them the basis of the present compilation, with an occasional remark, in a note, by way of explanation or suggestion, whenever he deemed it necessary.
L. S. C.
Boston, November 1, 1844.
This edition of Cushing’s Manual of Parliamentary Practice has annotations, etc., not to be found in any other edition of the Manual. The old edition of course could not be improved upon, but there were several passages in which the meaning could be brought out plainer by notes illustrating them. This has been done, and the reader will find that the notes will assist him materially.